The guy with the gun struggled for a second but then the demon began to glow and the guy just started running like hell was on his ass. Phaser Guy ran past them and the demon exploded behind them all, a gust of scorching hot air pushing them to the ground painfully. Xander could already feel the dirt grinding into his skin and settling into just opened wounds.
"Holy shit," the guy underneath Xander breathed and bucked Xander off of him. "That was unexpected."
Xander snorted and sat on the grass, trying in vain to wipe away dirt and blood from his left cheek. "A day in the life."
"It's still alive," Phaser Guy said as he lumbered over to Xander and leaned slightly on his knees, his dreads spreading forward.
"Yeah. They only go all explody like that when they're in danger or nervous," Xander said and flapped his hand over to the demon that was making keening noises. "They don't even eat people like most other baddies. It's relatively tame."
"That thing just exploded! How is it tame?" the guy next to Xander exclaimed and pointed with his gun rather carelessly.
"Can we ignore the fact that this thing just exploded for a second and talk about the fact that your friend totally has a phaser gun?" Xander interrupted and moved his head out of the way when the guy pointed his gun too close to Xander's face. Xander eyed the fact that the safety was on and didn't react with his initial reaction to break the guy's hand when repressed instincts from a Halloween many years ago surfaced for a tiny second. "I mean, it's not Star Trek or anything. More like a shotgun-phaser. That's kinda cool."
"Sheppard, the horns are growing."
Xander squinted at the demon and yep, the horns were definitely growing again. Xander fumbled for his bag and took out the small axe he'd gotten at Wal-Mart two weeks ago when they were doing a camping sale and he'd wanted to get equipment that was good but his budget was too low to afford otherwise. It was ridiculously useful to have around and after it got blessed a couple of times, cursed and spelled by several witches, and carved with protection sigils. Xander was going to be sad when he'd eventually lose it cutting off some vampire's head, because he is just that unlucky.
"Hey, what are you doing? Get away from that thing," Sheppard yelled as Xander moved closer to the demon.
Xander rolled his eyes and took a swing down to take off one of the horns, it came off cleanly and Xander rejoiced at one more horn that could be used for witchy potions. The second swing wasn't as clean-cut as the first but the horn came off nonetheless. The demon chirrup-howled and Xander had to look away from its pink eyes for a second before he began to hack down at its head until it completely detached from the neck. The head rolled a couple of times on the grass and then began to melt.
"At least these things are conscious enough to clean up after themselves when they die," Xander said and tried to flick demon blood from his axe before it began to eat away at it.
"What exactly was that?" Sheppard asked, his gun was still pointed and this time it was pointing somewhere in the area of Xander's chest.
Xander scratched his head to try and remember the demon's exact name but couldn't for the life of him remember what it was other than coughing and guttural sounds in a demon language. He said the demon name to them and Phaser Guy raised a brow at the sound and kicked casually at the goo slipping into the ground.
"Uh, we just call them explody demons that eat sewer rats and explode when they're in large crowds because they're nervous," Xander shrugged and then put the axe back in his bag as casually as anyone could put an axe into a bag when there was a guy pointing a gun at your chest and another holding a gun from the future. "The girls just call them Bob."
"You know these things?" Phaser Guy asked and pointed at the already gone goo and then over to the fallen tree.
"Who are you guys anyway?" Xander asked and picked up the two horns and put them in his bag. "You're obviously military," Xander pointed to Sheppard. "It's not that obvious because of the non-regulation hair but it's not that hard to see the military in you." He turned to eye Phaser Guy up and down. "You might be military, too, except you have shotgun-phaser and that's throwing me off a little. Are you guys testing experimental military weapons?"
"You cut the head off," Phaser Guy said.
"Yeah," Xander answered slowly and nodded his head. "If the horns grew back it was going to have a bigger explosion and this time it'd probably manage to kill us. I like being alive. Everyone should totally rejoice in being alive and not dead-dead because that doesn't seem all that fun and semi-dead usually comes with the stipulation of eating people and eating people is a no-no no matter where you come from… though, I think it's considered a thing in some places to eat people."
"You knew how to kill it."
"Most things die when you cut their heads off," Xander shrugged and then flapped one hand to the right. "If it doesn't die after you cut off its head then you're probably in over your head and will die a horrible, horrible death, and get eaten; can't forget the getting eaten part."
"You looked like you knew what you were doing," Sheppard commented and then his gun wavered for a second before he pointed just to the side of Xander's neck, or Xander assumed it was since he couldn't tell all that well where the gun was pointed with only one eye and he was pointing towards his eye patch.
"I've done it a time or two," Xander said with a shrug but his hands were already up in a surrendering motion. "These things kept showing up all over the place and I was hired to get rid of them. I'm kind of an exterminator-handyman-carver-chaperone type of guy."
"Why are these things appearing?" Sheppard asked and his gun didn't even waver.
"Global warming? Political unrest? Mating season? How should I know?"
"Shouldn't you know? You're killing them aren't you?"
"Because they're becoming a danger to people," Xander grumbled with a roll of his eyes. "They appeared in Ghirardelli Square a week ago and had a freak out that managed to send five people to the hospital and two of them won't ever be able to walk again. I was called in to deal with them and I'm doing that."
"Why did you take the horns?"
"They don't turn gooey when they die; they stay behind," Xander shrugged and lowered his arms a little because they were starting to hurt and Sheppard didn't look like he was going to shoot even though his gun was raised. The safety was still firmly on and it was just to scare Xander, it seemed. "I don't like to leave evidence that these things existed if I can help it."
"What are you going to do with the horns?" Sheppard asked and pointed at the bag across Xander's shoulders.
"Grind it to powder or put it in my living room, I don't know," Xander said and just gave up and put his arms down completely. "I'm just trying to do pest control here, buddy. If any more of these things get loose then there will be more people in the hospital which is bad."
"How do you kill these things?" Phaser Guy asked and his arms were crossed rather threateningly. His upper arms were bigger than Xander's head and his hands alone could probably squish Xander's head like a melon.
"Let it explode, let the horns grow back a little and cut them off, and then go straight to cutting the head off," Xander said casually. "They'll try to give you the puppy-dog stare but don't fall for it because by that point the horns are growing again and you'll spend too much time feeling sorry for it and it'll just blow up again and kill you."
"Why not just kill it after it explodes the first time and the horns are re-growing then?"
"Uh, they're still mushy and not yet solid."
"Technical term?"
"Yeah. All the cool kids use it."