Pest Control

"Need a ride?" Xander asked as he pulled in to the bus-stop.

"Xander?" Cordelia asked, surprised to see him.

"I'm assuming you're going to LA, but considering I plan on seeing all the states, the offer still stands," the dark haired young man promised.

"And what if I say Hawaii?" she asked with a grin.

"Then LAX is on the way, but considering the price of last minute tickets to Hawaii, we'd be sleeping on the beach."

"Hawaii," she challenged.

"Hop in," he replied.

Cordelia tossed her bags in the back seat and got in. As they drove off she realized he was completely serious. "I was joking about Hawaii. I have a cousin in LA who's putting me up for a few weeks."

"Good, cause if I left this car in long term storage the parking fees would be more than it's bluebook value," he joked.

"I always thought you were kidding about going on a roadtrip," Cordelia admitted. "I mean, have you ever even left Sunnydale?"

"No, can't say that I have," Xander admitted, "Which is just one more reason to do so, I was born and semi-raised in Sunnydale. Sure I've seen the mouth of Hell, and possess memories of hunting in Africa, and serving in various military units the world over, but… I forgot where I was going with this."

Cordelia laughed.

"Anyway Jack Kerouac wrote about his trip across America and it inspired me to do the same. I wanna see what there is to see before I return to the Hellmouth and go back to hunting monsters."

"High School's over," Cordelia said, "why do you have to be the one to hunt them?"

"Because they're there?" he asked. "The only thing that is required for evil to win is for good men to stand aside and do nothing," he quoted, "I'm not willing to stand aside."

"Better gas up," Cordelia said, deciding to change the subject rather than rehash old arguments.

Seeing it was another twenty miles to the next exit, Xander pulled off into a small hole in the wall town called Oatmen. Apparently it was a small town with a sense of humor about itself because he saw a store selling shirts that read 'Where the hell is Oatmen?'.

"Tourist trap," Cordelia said as she took in the town, which had taken steps to preserve its boom town roots. The mining museum and wooden sidewalks caught her eye however.

"Wanna look around?" Xander asked, seeing her interest.

"I don't want to delay your trip too much," she replied politely.

"Seeing little out of the way places like this is the reason for my trip."

"Then yeah, I would like to look around," she admitted.

"Good, cause I've never walked on wooden sidewalks or seen a real saloon before."

The two had a lot of fun poking around the town, finding the locals friendly and the town history interesting, especially the pictures they had of running their first mayor out of town on a rail. Xander bought a framed copy to send to Giles, figuring he'd get a kick out of seeing Richard Wilkins covered in tar and feathers.

They were eating lunch in the saloon when there was a loud boom like a cannon going off outside.

The sheriff poked his head in the front door a couple of minutes later and looked at Xander. "You weren't too attached to your car, were you?"

Xander groaned. "Not in particular, but it's going to be pretty hard to see the U.S. without a car."

The sheriff looked relieved. "As long as you're not too picky I can solve that problem. I've got a couple of cars on the impound lot you can choose from, I just don't want to deal with the insurance paperwork I'd have to fill out to explain how my nine year old nephew managed to shoot your car with an antique cannon."

"You're joking," Cordelia said, looking at the sheriff in disbelief.

"Nope, apparently there was an episode of MacGyver that had him improvising a canon of some sort using magnesium from a ten speed bike frame and rust and well…"

"Can we get pictures of him standing on the car wearing civil war gear?" Xander asked. "Because I want this in my photo album."

Seeing that Xander was more amused than anything else the sheriff smiled cheerfully. "We'll have to get it done quick, unless you want him with tears on his face 'cause his mama is going to whoop his ass when she finds out and this is a very small town."

Typing by: Stephenopolos

A/N: Just an idea for Cordelia joining the roadtrip.