Chapter 7: The Talk

Sunnydale, January 14th, 2017

"Let's talk." Buffy Summers ignored the pain she was feeling. She'd gone through the wringer, but she could deal with that. Had done so before - far too often.

She narrowed her eyes at the two thieves and kidnappers. The boy was still in armour, and the girl was wearing not very stylish clothes, but at least it was better than some fur and leather bikini. She bared her teeth at the two, who cringed. "Who are you? And who are you working for? And why do you want to steal my hammer?" She twirled the trollhammer to make her point. And suppressed the wince and groan the move almost caused - that demon-bitch had hurt her, again. Nothing broken, but she'd need an excuse for all the bruises she would be soon showing.

The two exchanged a glance. They looked really young. Barely older than Dawn, Buffy thought. So young, and already thieves...

"You said that the hammer - the Hammer of the Troll Gods, you called it - belongs to the trolls," Willow cut in.

Both of them winced. "It's not yours!" the girl said.

"I won it fair and square from a troll! Once you try to flatten me with it, you don't get to keep it!" Buffy retorted.

The boy gripped his sword harder and clenched his teeth.

"And you aren't trolls!" Buffy added. "You're too small, too human, and too… soft."

"Soft?" The boy glared at her.

"I fought Olaf. He had skin like a rock - if rocks had skin. You're no troll!" So there! Buffy smiled toothily.

"And you're not sunlight-challenged," Willow added. "I first thought the green makeup might be a magical makeup to resist sunlight - and that would've been a game-changer for the vampires!"

"And a rip-off of Robocop," Xander said.

Buffy didn't need to look at her friends to know Willow would be pouting at being interrupted. "Anyway, the fact they are both not wearing the makeup any more is proof that it wasn't magical sunblock!"

"Unless they removed it because the sun was setting," Xander said.

"That would've been reckless - what if we used a mirror to point sunlight at them? Shot them high enough so the sunrays would still reach them?" Willow asked.

"Oi! You can do that?" Spike asked.

"Well, theoretically," Willow said. "If we levitate someone high enough, it should work."

"Letting them fall from such a height would generally be enough to do them in, anyway," Buffy said. At least it would stun them long enough for her to finish them off. "Anyway, you're no trolls, so the hammer isn't yours. Not that it belongs to trolls anyway since it's my hammer." And it could hurt Glory, so Buffy needed it.

"Of course it belongs to trolls! It's a religious artefact, lost when your witch Aud banished Olaf to hell!" the boy said.

"A religious artefact? Buffy, we can't just take a religious artefact from people! Or trolls."

Buffy clenched her teeth and frowned at Willow. There was a time and place to discuss how to treat foreign cultures, but it wasn't when they were staring down a pair of thieves who had attacked them - and kidnapped Spike.

"They aren't trolls, Wills," Xander pointed out. "They'll probably try to sell the hammer to the highest bidder."

"We wouldn't! We're here to return it to its rightful owner!" the boy blurted out. "We aren't thieves!"

"I'm its rightful owner!" Buffy retorted. "See? I can wield it!" She twirled it around again. "And you look and act like thieves. Sneaky, sneaky, thieving… thieves."

"You Watcher would be proud of you for your eloquence," Spike said.

She glared at him. "Kidnapping victims should be grateful, not mouthy."

"Oh, I'm willing to show you exactly how grateful I am." He leered at her.

Her eyebrows went up. This wasn't the time to discuss that, either! Not there ever was a time to discuss… whatever Spike was talking about! She turned back to glare at the couple of thieves. Thieving couple. "Anyway, who do you work for?" She shook the hammer for emphasis."

"We work for the trolls," the boy told her.

"Prove it!" she snapped. Anyone could claim that.

"Well, I…"

Willows phone going off interrupted whatever the boy had been about to say. Buffy's Bestie took the call. "Yes?"

"Giles!"

Buffy cocked her head. Giles? What happened? He hadn't been with the Council. She gasped. Dawn!

"Is everyone OK?" Willow asked.

"Apparently, Nigel and Philip were wounded in a scuffle in the park," Buffy heard Giles answer. Who cared about the Council! "Everyone else is fine. How are you? I couldn't reach Buffy!"

Buffy winced - she had forgotten to inform the others about everything!

"Oh, she broke her phone fighting Glory," Willow said.

"Glory? What?"

Buffy winced again - she didn't need Slayer hearing to hear Giles this time.

"Oh, she's OK. A bit, ah, battered? Bruised? Beaten up?"

"Way to go with the supportive talk," Buffy grumbled.

"Sorry!"

"Where are you?"

"At Spike's," Buffy said loud enough for the phone to pick up.

"At Spike's? Why would you…? Never mind! I'm on the way!"

Great. Buffy hoped Giles wouldn't take his car.


The Slayer was evil, James Lake Jr. knew. She might act like a normal girl - joking and grumbling - but she held the Hammer of the Troll Gods easily in one hand, and the way she glared at Claire and himself… He suppressed a shudder. She wasn't human, that was certain. And the things she and her friends joked about! Killing people and getting hurt… the massacre of those knights hadn't fazed them at all; they must be used to such carnage. Well, William the Bloody was amongst those friends!

Though compared to that monster who had attacked them, even the Slayer looked sort of harmless. Only in comparison, of course.

"So, who are you?" the red-haired witch - Willow - asked. "And where did you get those items?" She held the staff up. "It's incredibly powerful!"

Jim could see the greed in the girl's eyes. And he could see the fury in Claire's eyes. She wanted her staff back. And Jim feared that she wouldn't agree to leave without it. Not that it was sure that they would be able to leave, anyway.

"She asked a question!" the Slayer snapped.

"I'm not going to tell you anything!" Claire spat back. "Not to friends of William the Bloody!"

"I see Spike made an impression," the man with the broken arm said with a grin.

"I can't help that I'm famous!"

"That's infamous," the Slayer said. "And Spike isn't exactly a friend."

"Oi!"

"He's more like an… ally?" the redhead said. "Uh… co-belligerent?" She tilted her head to her side.

"Rabid dog we keep on a leash?" The man's grin widened.

"Oi! I'll show you who's a dog, you wanker!"

"Oh? Really? Come on, take your best shot!" The man smiled and tapped his chin with his good hand. "I won't even try to dodge!"

The vampire growled and balled his fist, but the man remained unfazed. If he could take a vampire's blow, he would have to be even more dangerous than William the Bloody!

"Enough!" The Slayer stood - jumped down from the coffin - and glared at her friends. Or minions. "Spike's... Spike. Our relationship is none of your concern," she added with a glare at Claire and Jim. "You, on the other hand, are a concern!" She pointed the hammer at them. One-handed.

Jim tensed.

"So, once again: Who are you, and who do you work for?"

"They're Claire and Jim," the redhead said. "At least those were the names they used, and since that was in a high-stress situation, I think they are probably their real names. Although it's not implausible that they were trying to fool us."

"Naw, those are their real names. See how they twitched?" The vampire grinned.

"Claire and Jim." The Slayer nodded. "Now we're getting somewhere."

Damn.

"And who do you work for? It isn't Glory."

Could he reveal their secret? That would endanger everyone. On the other hand, they already said the hammer belonged to trollkind and that they were working for trolls… "We work for the trolls," Jim said. He noticed Claire drawing a sharp breath, but she didn't say anything.

"Anyone can claim that! We need proof!" The Slayer scoffed. "And of course you'd say that if you wanted to sell the hammer to the highest bidder."

"You'd know all about that, wouldn't you?" Claire retorted. "Looting demons and selling their belongings!"

"What? We don't do that!" the redhead protested. "Even though Anya wants us to!"

"And even though I could really use more money for new clothes and shoes, what with the Council not paying us and slaying being hell on my wardrobe."

"Buffy!" The redhead frowned at her.

"What? That wasn't a bad joke!"

"Yes, it was!"

"You want to rob demons because you want new shoes?" Claire sounded as shocked as Jim felt. This was…

"Hey! Don't knock it until you've tried it." The Slayer frowned at them, and Jim took a step in front of Claire. Of course, she immediately stepped to the side to face the Slayer.

Then the Slayer sneered at her. "Besides, you have no leg to stand on to diss my fashion choices, Miss leather and fur bikini!"

Claire blushed like a tomato. "That… that was a disguise!" she sputtered.

"Oh, that was a very cunning disguise, what with exposing more skin than a tanning booth when sessions are half-off!" The Slayer chuckled.

"We had a tight budget! Because we don't rob people and demons!" Claire blurted out.

"Wow. Another shady employer exploiting teenage labour? Is this a theme or what?" the man with the broken arm asked.

"Yes, it's called capitalism," the redhead replied.

"You're discussing politics in my absence?" a voice with a British accent cut in.

Jim turned and saw that a middle-aged man had just entered.

"Giles! What kept you?"

"The fact that the police are looking for a mass murderer."


"A mass murderer?" Willow asked with a gasp.

"They are investigating Glory," Buffy Summers told her. "Right?" She turned to look at Giles.

"Dozens dead - many of them dismembered - in the middle of the town apparently is more than even the Sunnydale Police Department is willing or able to cover up," Giles said.

"I wouldn't bet on that." Xander shook his head. "They've ignored everything else, haven't they?"

"They went after me for the robot creep. And for the attack in school!" Buffy protested.

"That was on the order of the Mayor, I believe. At least the second part," Willow said. "Otherwise, they'd have blamed… well, they blamed wild animals for Principal Flutie's death, remember?"

"To be fair, he was eaten. Just not by wild animals," Xander said. Buffy looked at him - the hyena spirit possessions were still a bit of a sore point for him, but he looked fine. Apart from his broken arm.

"You've had your principal eaten as well?" the boy - Jim - blurted out, then grimaced, pressing his lips together.

"'As well'?" Willow was already going through her smartphone.

"The cops here aren't Scotland Yard," Spike said. "They know that this isn't a normal mass murder case and that they don't want to find who killed all the idiots. So they won't actually look for Glory."

"How would they cover up dozens of dead people? In the middle of the town?" the girl asked.

"Drugged bikers gone wild?" Xander shrugged. "Gang war? Suicide cult?"

"They acted like a cult," Buffy cut in. "And they were attacking Glory even though they were totally outclassed. So… suicide cult fits."

"Except for the fact that they didn't kill each other," Willow pointed out. "Though that's easily fixed in a report. If you don't actually do a real autopsy, you can attribute most wounds to the same melee weapons the knights used."

"So, business as usual," Buffy said with a sigh. Sunnydale didn't really change, not even after the Mayor had been dealt with and after the Initiative had been... She gasped. "Do you think there's another government conspiracy? The Mayor kept everything covered up, and after we killed him, the government stepped in, but they pulled out, so is there another government agency active?"

"You've killed the Mayor?"

Buffy glared at the boy. "He was trying to eat my entire class!"

"And he would have destroyed much of the state," Willow added.

"And I would caution you to stop admitting to questionable actions in front of our guests," Giles pointed out in his dry scolding voice that sent Buffy back to school. Mentally, at least.

"Right." She nodded. "Back to business. You claim to work for trolls and want to steal my hammer."

"The Hammer of the Troll Gods," the girl tried to correct her.

"It belongs in a museum!" Xander wasn't nearly as funny as he thought he was.

And everyone shared Buffy's opinion - even the two wanna-be thieves glared at him.

Except for Spike, who chuckled.

Giles cleared his throat. "You claim to be working for trolls? I find that hard to believe. Trolls have been insular for centuries, ever since the last war between them and humanity drove them underground."

"That wasn't a war between trolls and humans, but between Gunmar and his brainwashed slaves and trolls with the help of humans," the boy said, bristling.

"Really?" Giles pushed his glasses up with his index finger. "And you base this on what exactly?"

"I've studied the matter!"

"You've access to records detailing the troll wars?" Giles looked sceptical. And interested, of course - if he ever looked at a woman as he looked at rare books, Buffy would organise a wedding.

"We're not telling you anything! You'd just try to steal the records!" the girl spat.

"Says the thief!" Buffy countered.

"We aren't thieves! We're working for the legitimate owners of the hammer!" the girl retorted. "Recovering stolen property isn't theft."

"Only if said ownership can be proven," Giles pointed out. "And, so far, you've failed to prove your claim, I believe."

The two kids looked at each other, then at Buffy and her friends. Hah! Couldn't prove their claims, could they?

"You're just trying to find the trolls so you can loot their homes," the girl said with a glare. "We know what you do!"

"Then you're ahead of us. We usually don't know what we're doing," Xander replied.

"The Slayer and her friends, amongst whom I have the honour to count myself, protect humanity against the forces of darkness," Giles said, standing straight. "Unless your employers wish humanity ill, they have nothing to fear from us."

"Prove it!" the girl challenged him.

"And how would you wish me to prove our intentions to you?" Giles asked.

That had them stumped, Buffy could tell.


How could the Slayer prove their intentions after everything that they had heard? James Lake Jr. was at a loss for words.

"Handing my staff back would be a first step as a gesture of trust," Claire said before Jim could come up with something.

"Yeah, right. And you send us all into the sun or ocean or something?" the Slayer retorted

"I'm not sure if that would actually work. I mean, the actual sun, not sunlight. The ocean, however, would totally work since we're on the coast," the redhead added. "Although I don't know how far the staff can reach and what its limits are." She held the folded staff up.

Claire made a step forward, but Jim put his hand on her shoulder. They were outnumbered and, as much as he didn't like to admit it, outclassed. At least without the staff. He could hold off the Slayer - though only for a few minutes, at most - and he might even kill the vampire pretty quickly if Daylight was as deadly for vampires as it was for trolls. But that left the witch, the other witch who hadn't said anything yet, and the two men. Without her staff, Claire was just a normal girl. He couldn't protect her against that. He couldn't even hold everyone off while she escaped because she couldn't run, not with the Slayer and her friends blocking the way out of this crypt.

So, fighting wouldn't save them. That left talking. And while the things Claire and Jim had overheard were very disturbing, the fact that the Slayer hadn't just used their obvious advantage to overwhelm them might mean that she wasn't as bad as Jim feared. Gunmar and his allies certainly wouldn't have hesitated to crush them.

Unless she liked to play with her victims. Which could be very much the case for a millennia-old demon.

"So?" The Slayer stared at them.

"What Buffy means," the redhead said, "is that leaving aside proposals like 'hand over the hammer', how can we prove to you that we aren't the bad guys?"

Judging by the look the Slayer sent to her friend, that wasn't quite the meaning she had meant, or so Jim thought.

"And why do you think we're the bad guys, anyway?" The Slayer actually pouted. "Not counting Spike's presence."

"We heard you discussing your plans!" Claire blurted out. "With the Council."

"Our plans?" The Slayer looked surprised.

"We have a plan?" the man with the broken arm added. "Why doesn't anyone tell me these things?"

"We have one… I think. Do we?" the redhead sounded honestly confused. "Does ambushing them count, since we did that and now don't have to any more, so we don't actually have it as a plan any more?"

"We had a perfectly good plan, and then Glory came and wrecked it," the Slayer said.

"Together with a few dozens of knights," William the Bloody added.

"Children…" the older man - Giles - said with a heavy sigh.

"Who are you calling children? I'm three times your age!" the vampire complained.

"Then act your age, Spike," the man retorted.

"The… their a- auras a-aren't evil." The blonde witch spoke up, apparently surprising everyone.

"Huh?"

"I've b-been studying th-their auras ever since we a-arrived here. It's not t-tainted or c-corrupted."

"So they're no demons. We already knew that," the Slayer said. "They could still be working for a demon."

"No." The redhead shook her head. "If they had fought for a demon, that would leave traces in their aura. Unless this is the first time they are working for a demon. Or they don't know who they are working for."

Jim bit his lower lip. This could be a ploy to make him reveal their secrets. But why would they pick such a ruse, trying to pass as good people? They could just capture them and then use Claire as leverage to make Jim reveal everything… especially after Jim had tried to exchange the vampire as a hostage for the hammer.

If the Slayer was evil, they wouldn't let them go anyway. But if she wasn't, and this was just a misunderstanding… He raised his chin. "I'm the Trollhunter."

The Slayer blinked. "You hunt trolls? You said you worked for them!"

"You want the Hammer of the Troll Gods to hunt trolls?" the redhead asked.

"No!" Claire snapped. "We work for trollkind."

"Then why call yourself Trollhunter?" The Slayer shook her head. "That's not how it works. I'm the Slayer; I slay vampires; I don't work for them."

The redhead coughed. "Well, we sometimes work with them."

"Those are exceptions! Angel and Spike don't count!"

"Oi! Don't compare me to the poof!"

"You don't compare to him!"

"What?"

The older man cleared his throat. "The Trollhunter is a legendary figure of troll lore. The protector of trollkind - and, according to some legends, also a protector of humans against man-eating trolls."

Jim nodded. That was right. It seemed that at least one of the Slayer's group had heard of him.

"However, the lore is very clear in that the Trollhunter is a troll, not a human."

And they were back to glaring at him.

"The Trollhunter is chosen by the amulet Merlin crafted. It chose me, as the first human Trollhunter, when my predecessor was killed," Jim explained, tapping his armour. "I've done my best to help trolls and humans ever since. With the help of my friends."

Claire stepped closer to him, laying a hand on his armoured shoulder. The others were looking at him with various expressions - mostly doubtful. The Slayer, though…

...she was looking at him with pity?


"So, like, the Trollhunter gets killed, and the next one is chosen?" Buffy Summers narrowed her eyes at the boy.

"Ah… Sort of?" The boy shrugged.

"You just wake up with the armour on? Or an amulet on your chest?" Or did that go into your chest, like with Iron Man?

"Not exactly. The amulet chooses, but it won't, ah, move by itself."

She leaned forward. "So, someone hands it to you? Check if it takes?"

"I, ah, picked it up."

"Picked it up?" She was in his face now.

"From the corpse of my predecessor, actually. Kanjigar the Courageous. But I didn't know it at the time - it looked just like stones and rubble."

"And then someone came by, some oldish mentor type, and told you all about duty and fate and fighting the darkness?"

"Uh… Kinda? It was a little more complicated." He shrugged again.

She knew it. "Someone tried to kill you?"

"Well… a few, yes."

Buffy shook her head. "Welcome to the club. What's the average life expectancy of a Trollhunter?"

"It, ah, varies." And he was looking away. Typical.

"Worst case?"

"Uh… six hours? That was Unkar the Unfortunate, though..." The boy smiled. Weakly. "Kanjigar lived for a long time. Long-ish?"

Of course, they wouldn't tell him! "Did they tell you that you come with an expiration date now? "

"Well, it kinda comes with the territory? You know, always fighting to protect others... " He shrugged again. "Can't be lucky all the time."

"Jim!" the girl protested.

He turned to smile at her. "Hey! I'm not going to die anytime soon."

He was lying, of course. Buffy could tell. "Welcome to the club," she told him.

He snorted, but the girl glared at her. "Don't joke about it! Jim doesn't jump into a new body when… if he dies!"

Buffy frowned at her. "What are you talking about? That's not how it works!"

"We've read about the Slayer. An immortal demon possessing the bodies of young women since time immemorial," the girl told her. "How long have you been wearing this one?"

What the…? "That's my body!" Buffy protested.

"Same as it's your hammer?" The girl sniffed.

"That's not how it works!" Buffy clenched her teeth and suppressed the urge to show the little girl her place. Her, a demon? "The Slayer spirit doesn't possess you like taking you over!"

"Only in special circumstances. Which are very rare and very special."

"Not helping, Will," Buffy spat. "Anyway - you get the power of the Slayer Spirit. But the mind?" She tapped her forehead. "That's all you." Mostly.

"Oh." The boy stared at her. "That's…"

"Rough, I know." She snorted without humour. "I've been beating the odds for years. I should have died years ago according to the statistics."

"Technically, you did die," Xander pointed out. "We brought you back."

Now the two were staring at her. Buffy rolled her eyes. "CPR. Some really icky and ugly master vampire tried to drown me."

"Ah."

"You were dead enough for the Slayer Spirit to count. Or something," Xander insisted. "That's why Kendra was activated."

Kendra. Who had lasted close to a year.

"You aren't the slayer any more?" the girl asked.

"I am the Slayer," Buffy corrected her. "It's just that there are two of us now."

The two teenagers looked at the others in the crypt, and Buffy sighed again. "She's not here." And if Faith returned, it would be the last mistake the other Slayer would ever make. "Anyway, so you get told about your duty, then sent into battle, and then the training starts so you'll last a little longer?"

"Ah… actually…" The boy trailed off. "It's not quite like that, but… sorta?"

"Thought so." She glanced at Giles, who looked stricken. "And you've been a good little soldier?"

"Someone has to protect the trolls and humans, and I've been chosen." He stared at her.

Oh, boy. They got him good. Had she ever been that naive? "So, you gathered some friends, and now you're fighting demons for trolls?"

"He didn't gather us - we chose to help!" the girl spat. "That's what friends do."

"Yes!" Willow, unsurprisingly, agreed.

Buffy shook her head. "I didn't know there were more of us. It seems like a theme."

For a long moment, no one said anything.

"So," Buffy went on, you were sent here by trolls to recover the trollhammer."

"Hammer of the Troll Gods," the girl insisted.

"Whatever. I'm not very religious." Buffy waved the correction away. "And the trolls stay safely home?"

Giles coughed, but she ignored him, focusing on the two teenagers.

"They can't exactly travel on the surface," the Trollhunter replied. "Sunlight kills trolls."

"Oh, I know the feeling," Spike butted in. "Did you try covering a car's windows with duct tape?"

"How would you see enough to drive?" the girl asked.

"I managed. Of course, I could stay in motels during the day. And eat the staff." Spike chuckled, then looked around. "But that was back in the past."

"Yeah... Moving on." Buffy eyed the two kids. "So, while you don't seem too bad and Tara vouches for you, I don't exactly trust your handlers." She narrowed her eyes again.

"Blinky's a good troll!" the boy protested.

Buffy blinked. "'Blinky'?"

"Must be Californian trolls," Spike said, shrugging.


"Blinkous Galadrigal," James Lake Jr. said. He frowned - what right did they have to make fun of Blinky?

"And you call him Blinky." The Slayer stared at him, then started to grin and glanced at the older man who had joined them in the crypt.

The man raised an eyebrow at her. "I know you're trying to come up with a similarly endearing nickname," he said with a faint smile.

"It's not fun if you like it," the Slayer complained with a pout. She turned back to Jim and Claire. "So! This Blinky is your Watcher. He trains you, gives you missions - like 'recover the trollhammer from the Slayer who won it fair and square' - and has you write reports?"

"We didn't know who had the hammer," Jim protested. "And no, I don't write reports." Paperwork? As the Trollhunter? He suppressed a shudder. Mom had told him often enough how horrible all the paperwork at the hospital was, and he wrote enough reports for school.

"No reports?" The Slayer blinked. "Giles! See, it is entirely possible to drop reports!"

"Without detailed reports, future Slayers might lack the information they need to deal with a threat," the man replied, then grimaced and coughed. "I mean…"

"If the Council weren't some stuck-up evil old men trying to control everyone." The Slayer nodded.

"You don't record what you do?" the redhead asked, almost shocked. "But… that means… what about history? Your history?"

"Blinky writes the reports," Jim said. At least he thought that that was the case. "He has a library full of books about trolls."

"And we can read them!" Claire added.

"Who would want to read them?" the Slayer muttered before beaming at the older man. "Giles! You always complain about my handwriting! And you rewrite everything anyway. Wouldn't it be faster and more efficient if you wrote the reports in the first place?"

"I would still need your information," Giles replied. "And, I'll remind you, that's how we usually do the reports: You tell me what happened, and I distil your meandering words into intelligible information."

"I think I've just been insulted," the Slayer said.

"Meandering means…" the witch started.

"I know what it means, Wills." The Slayer cleared her throat. "Anyway! As I said, you look like you're of the non-evil types. Not the brightest, but not slimy backstabbing evil demon types."

Claire was scowling at the Slayer but didn't speak up, for which Jim was grateful.

"But I don't trust your Watchers," the woman went on. "You wouldn't be the first innocent Slayer-like teenager manipulated and exploited by shadowy men from the shadows."

"'Shadowy men from the shadows'? Seriously?" Claire blurted out.

"Hey! The Slayer was created by the shadow men. Or something like that," the Slayer told her.

"That wasn't my point."

"But it was mine. And you keep distracting me! Anyway - I want to talk to your Blinky."

"That's difficult. He's not here. He's far away," Jim said.

"Not too far away. He's in California," the witch said. "And close enough for you to travel to Sunnydale."

"What?" Jim stared at her.

The witch explained. "You both got a local accent. You aren't runaways - you would've been better prepared for this if you were. So, you're still in school. Which means you can't be travelling too far to arrive in Sunnydale. Your parents probably don't know what you're doing, because… girl and two boys, travelling alone? Not many adults would let you do that unsupervised."

Claire winced at that. Jim hoped he didn't blush.

But the redhead was still going on: "Of course, it's a very sexist and frankly insulting view, and totally ignores that if you were intent on having sex, you'd be easily able to find opportunities at home unless your parents utterly deny you any freedom and privacy. Your parents could be the exception, of course, but they would be pretty rare, and even supposedly liberal and smart parents can be very short-sighted and traditional in the worst sense when it comes to sex."

"Is this about your parents not allowing you to come camping with Jesse and me?" the young man asked.

"We were ten! There was no way anything like that would happen!" the redhead protested. "They should've been aware of that!"

"I think it was more the fact that we were ten and going camping, not the unsupervised part - I mean, unsupervised was the problem since we were ten and going camping by ourselves, not because they thought we would… Where was I?" The man blinked.

"Halfway to offtopic land. Population: two," the Slayer told him. "So! Your Watcher, me, talking. Capisce?"

"We can call him," Claire said.

"Trolls have phones?" Giles asked. "Fascinating. I would have suspected that they were rather more conservative with regards to human inventions. Did they lay a phone line to their subterranean habitats?"

"Wow, even trolls are more adapted to modern life than Giles!" the young man said, chuckling.

"I've been using a cell phone for years," Giles protested.

"To make calls," the man replied. "You don't use it for anything else. That's unnatural!"

"No, that's Giles. And old people," the Slayer said. "But we can start with a phone call."

Well, it was better than nothing, Jim thought as he dug out his phone.


Buffy Summers tried not to make it obvious that she was listening in when the boy dialled. Trust, but verify, as Giles would say - and she didn't trust the kind of people or trolls who would pick a teenager and turn them into a "chosen warrior".

"Master Jim?"

'Master Jim'? Buffy blinked. That was… weird. Or kinky. Ew. She buried the thought. After bashing it to death with a shovel.

"Hi, Blinky!"

"Tobias hasn't woken up yet, but his vitals are well. Are you on the way back?"

Ah. The third one of the trio. The one Dawn had almost killed, apparently.

"Uh… something came up," Jim said. "Well, lots of somethings, actually. But there's one thing that's kinda most important for now."

"Are you and the Fair Claire well?"

Fair Claire? Buffy glanced at the girl. Well, she was pretty, but her style needed some help. And that stripe in her hair… Fairly pretty, maybe. For a kid.

"Yes. Well, now. Mostly."

"Mostly," the girl added with a deep frown.

"That sounds a little concerning. Oh! Can you talk freely?"

Ah! There came the sneaky part. The voice had almost fooled Buffy so far, but no more!

"Uh, yes. Pretty much. But we're kinda in… negotiations."

"Negotiations?"

"With the Slayer. And her friends."

"Master Jim! The Slayer is a very dangerous demon! You need to extract yourself and the Fair Claire from the premises at once!"

She wasn't a demon! Why did they get this wrong? Buffy narrowed her eyes at the phone.

"Uh… that's kind of the problem, you see, we're kind of stuck…"

"Stuck? What happened?"

"The Slayer and her friends captured us, took my staff, and they think you forced us to fight for the trolls so they want to talk to you," the girl cut in.

"What? Captured? How? And… talk to me?"

"Put him on speaker!" Buffy said. The boy did. The girl glared at her again. She ignored her. "Blinky?"

"Blinkous Galadrigal. Are you the Slayer?" The voice sounded a little tinny. Not a good speaker on that phone.

"Yes. And I'm not a demon possessing the body of a girl! Whoever told you that was lying! Or stupid! Or both!" They had to deal with the important things first!

"Oh. That is… well… You would claim this even if it were true, though, Lady Slayer."

She rolled her eyes. "It isn't true! Note that down! The Slayer spirit doesn't take over a body - it latches onto you and fills your head with memories and skills and makes you stronger!" Giles muttered something about being glad that the Travers wasn't here, but she ignored that as well.

"That's fascinating. But did you just call to correct the information in my library?"

"What? No! We've got your two child soldiers here," she told the troll. "And you have the third, who got almost killed for attacking us."

"We aren't children!" the girl protested. The boy nodded a moment later. "And Blinky didn't force us to do anything."

"Yeah, yeah, Been there, done that. Look, I know the drill."

"The drill?"

Right. Trolls. "I know the score."

"The score?"

Buffy clenched her teeth and growled. "I know how that works. You go all 'fate this, chosen that, demons here, fight!', and the boy fights or gets killed. Or fights and gets killed."

"The amulet of Merlin chose him."

"And the Slayer spirit chose me."

"Then you understand that those decisions are out of our hands."

Buffy glanced at Giles. The troll sounded a lot like him. Well, not the actual voice, but the way they were so 'reasonable'. "Is this a librarian thing?"

"Pardon?" The troll sounded confused. Giles looked confused, Buffy noted.

"The way you talk. All reasonable-like and 'it's not my fault' and stuff," she explained.

"I like to think that common sense, logic and reason aren't limited to librarians. Although I'm not a librarian - I'm a scholar. Of some renown, I would hope, at least amongst trolls, though there are a few who would disagree."

"They just don't like it that we're friends," Jim cut in. "And that I'm a human."

"Well, that, and my rather mixed efforts at training you."

Definitely a Watcher-type, Buffy noted to herself. "Yes, yes. Anyway, you sent the kids to steal my hammer, and that almost got them killed. And while we know they aren't evil, we don't know that you aren't evil. You could be very evil - the kind of smooth, talky evil that manipulates teenagers into doing dirty deeds for your…" She blinked. "I mean, actual dirty deeds, not the…" She felt her cheeks grow warm. "You know what I mean, I mean, what I didn't mean!"

"Uh… I'm afraid you have me at a disadvantage here, Lady Slayer."

What? "Whatever. I mean, you could be the kind of manipulative evil that convinces teenagers to work for your evil plans without them noticing."

"What? Preposterous! I'm a loyal troll!"

"Yeah, well… trolls? The last troll I met wanted to eat babies!"

She heard the troll gasp. "You met a gumm-gumm?"

"A chewing gum?" Buffy asked. "Like those balls you used to get from those vending machines?"

"No. A gumm-gumm is a troll working for Gunmar. They, uh, generally have an inclination for the consumption of humans."

"Bad," a very gravelly voice added.

"Yeah, bad," Buffy agreed. "So, we can't trust you over the phone. And we don't want to give the girl her teleporting staff back if she's unknowingly working for evil trolls."

"We're not working for evil trolls! We fight them!" Jim blurted out.

"I earned that staff!" the girl protested with a glare.

"And I won the hammer fair and square. So?" Buffy retorted. "Anyway - we want to check you. For evil-ness."

"Check me?" the troll sounded confused.

"Yes," Buffy confirmed. "So, you get your stony butt over here so Tara can check if you're evil or not!"

The troll remained silent for a moment. Then he started to talk. "I, uh, am limited to travelling at night, and while it's already night, I also lack transportation."

"You don't have a trollmobile?" Buffy asked.

"The gyre doesn't stop at the Hellmouth."

"He actually has a trollmobile?" Xander sounded delighted.

"It sounds more like a troll train," Willow added.

Buffy silenced both with a glare. "So, you can't come to Sunnydale?"

"I'm afraid I cannot. Not feasibly. I would have to learn how to drive first. And travel at night. Although I might disguise myself and take the bus?"

"No!" Claire blurted out.

Buffy glanced at them. They looked pale.

"Blinky! You can't drive!" Jim said.

"But I can learn. It cannot be too hard, can it? Every human is doing it."

The kids were grimacing. Buffy sighed. "So, we'll have to come to you, then. To sort this out." And, perhaps, get Dawn away from Glory.

"The Slayer, coming to Trollmarket? Oh, dear!"

Now he really sounded like Giles.