To the Power Born: A Tale of the Slayers

Part 7: Consequences of Power

Dinner… yow. Xander Harris is a great guy in a lot of ways, but I swear, I'd about sleep with him for his recipe for pizza sauce!

Mi Kyong ate a little more like a Slayer, seemed stunned at the amount of food she put away— then watched in amazement as I finished off the large deep dish I had all to myself.

After dinner, I left Mi Kyong and Rhiannon, the other new girl, to talk to Willow, Aunt Dawn and Aunt Rose for a bit, and I went off to a conference with Dad, Giles, Buffy, Xander, Vincent, Colin and Aunt Sh'rin (who knows tons about seers and other oracular types). We talked about that little vampire ambush that had been waiting for Vincent, Mi Kyong and I at the prison camp— and we got nowhere.

"I can say only that the visionary must have been quite powerful," Aunt Sh'rin said. "To first know precisely where to put those vampires, and second to put them in place after the team went in but before they came out? Someone or something had unusually clear visions, or perhaps unusual skill at interpreting them."

"Wolfram and Hart, perhaps?" Giles said, referring to a law firm staffed in part by supernatural critters, and in its entirety by utter and complete shitheads.

"I doubt it," Whitey said. "They've had the fear of Team Slayer put into one time too many for it to be them— this soon, at least. Only been six months since they tried to buy into Intertech Armorers and got caught out. I think the little chat that you, Willow, Rose and Elaine had with them probably still has them running scared. You killed what, four dozen demons this time? That's got to be annoying— and maybe expensive."

(Intertech Armorers is the company that makes a lot of the specialized weapons some Slayers use, and the armor that we all wear when things get hairy enough to call for armor. Wolfram and Hart tried to buy into them in hope of setting up a hostile takeover and getting leverage on Team Slayer that way. Idiots.)

"I do not know who it could have been," Sh'rin said. "But I tell you truly, they have a power to be… concerned over. That sort of precision of vision is… troubling."

"Everyone, spread the word amongst your compatriots— any unusual precision of response is to be reported to the home office— meaning me," Giles said. "In the meantime, we shall table this until we have more to work with.

"Now… another matter, a bit closer to home," Giles continued. "After the effort it took him to destroy all the vehicles at the prison camp where Mi Kyong was being held, Colin became concerned, and managed to communicate his concern to me— I expect that, should there ever be an international charades competition, he could lead a team to victory, he's quite good.

"Colin's abilities involving the channeling of stellar energies are not functioning in the fashion to which he has, over the last year or so, become accustomed."

I turned to look up at Colin, concerned, and he motioned for me to listen to Giles— point, that had to be easier than pantomiming.

"With the aid of Willow and Dawn— whose non-traditional magical style once again came in very useful— we managed to determine some things about Colin's abilities, and why they seem to be working differently.

"The primary difference is one of a very subtle difference in the laws of physics. While his powers do still work here, and are capable of functioning at the same power levels that he is used to… he cannot function at those levels for long. His powers are still recharging, this we know, thanks to Willow and Dawn— but much, much more slowly than they did in his home universe. At home, he would never have noticed a dip in power over the things he did in the prison camp— here, the exercise put him to, he thinks, something a little below forty percent of his usual power levels. If the spell Willow cast is at all accurate, it will take him at least a week, perhaps as long as ten days, to recharge to full."

"Oh, boy," I said. "Okay, you just have to be careful, Colin. No going dry in a fight— now your combat lessons are even more important."

"Yes, well… perhaps more important than you think, even, Jocelyn." Giles took off and polished his glasses, which is rarely a good sign. "There is a deeper concern besides that of Colin simply running out of power in a fight."

"What concern?" I asked, trying not to sound sharp.

"Well… Willow?" Giles said. "I think you might explain this better."

"I'll try," Willow said. "Jocelyn, we think that… well, the magics that brought Colin here weren't meant to bring him— I'm still not sure what they were meant to bring, but it was nasty— and so those magics aren't holding him here.

"See, really powerful things from another universe tends to gravitate to that universe. I don't mean dimensions, but parallel universes. Colin is way powerful, so he should be feeling the pull of his own universe, should probably have gone back there by now— but something's holding him here.

"I think that what it is that's holding him here is his connection with the source of his powers, which, if he and I are right, is pretty much a white hole— the other end of a black hole."

"But… how would that even work?" Xander asked. "How does a connection to some other power source not of this universe hold him here?"

"Well… look, Xander, the hole he left in his universe is Colin-shaped," Willow said. "And the hole to the power-source is… well, it's as big as Colin, but it's star-shaped (not literally, but you get the idea), and the star-shaped hole is the same size as he is, but shaped different, and a totally different… um, frequency will have to do, even if it's not the right word. So the holes can't pass through each other, and Colin stays here.

"But if he runs out of power, and that star-shaped hole closes, even for a second… there's a really good chance that Colin will snap back to his universe. Not a hundred percent, no, and it does go down the longer he stays here, but… it could happen."

I must have gone pale. I know that Colin squeezed me more tightly, and Buffy, sitting on my other side, reached over and took my hand, squeezed it gently, even as Dad said, "Jocelyn, are you all right?"

"I'm… I don't know," I said. "Colin… you be careful! Don't run dry, Colin— don't you dare! I love you, and I… you be careful!"

Colin looked at me and solemnly crossed his heart. I nodded, hugged him and leaned more fully against him.

"Sorry," I said. "I just… I just found him. The idea of losing him—"

"Yes, I do understand," Giles said. "Willow does think that eventually, his stay in this universe will cause him to adapt completely, thus eliminating this danger, but in the meantime… do be careful, Colin, please. I have come to like you— and I would not see my goddaughter hurt."

Colin nodded, pulled me closer still— and I said a mental "to hell with it," and slid into his lap.

"Willow, how long before there's no real danger of Colin being jerked back to his original universe by his power reserves going dry?" I asked.

"Maybe as fast as six months," Willow said. "Certainly by the ten month mark he'll have… have made a permanent, Colin-shaped hole here, and that will close the one back to his original universe. As it is… I'm guessing, because I don't know anything about his universe, but I think it would be more like a ninety-five percent chance of him getting yanked home if he went dry now. And since we don't know of anyone magical in his world, or what spell brought him here in the first place…."

"Take no chances," Dad said. "I want my daughter happy, I'm damned glad you're here for my own sake, and you will therefore be careful, Colin. Please."

Again, Colin crossed his heart— then he kissed me, soft and gentle.

The meeting broke up after that, and we went back out to watch a movie with everyone else in the living room.

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Interlude:

"Damn, that didn't pan out," the man said, sitting back and looking at his female companion. "Well, I didn't really think it would. Too easy, no time to get serious forces in play there— and the brat is a vampire Slayer, after all. Add in the gene-gineered guy and… whatever that flying guy was that helped them, and it really wasn't likely to work."

"I'll have another vision that will give us a better chance sooner or later," the woman said. She sighed, stretched, and added, "It's inevitable. I just wish I could control the visions."

"Maybe I'll figure out a way to induce them," the man said. "If I could just get an EEG setup onto you while you were having one, it'd help— but I won't ask you to wear one all the time. Since they don't seem to be coming as frequently since we got you on the meds…."

"I know, but those… I don't want to stop," the woman said, and shuddered a little bit. "The idea of going back to feeling like I did before them… no. I can't do that."

"No blame here," the man said. "It's all about control, baby— I understand not wanting to be that out of control. I used to have… poor impulse control myself. Especially where the women were concerned. But I got rid of that problem, and now… well, I'm more in control than ever."

"Oh, I know," the woman said, and gave him a teasing smile. "I mean… you've never even made a pass at me, and I know you think I'm attractive."

"Not for lack of wanting you," the man said. "But— well, let's just say that while I got rid of my impulse control issues with the women, I didn't get rid of all my hang-ups about women. I don't want to go there with you because it'd totally fuck up our working relationship. Can't have that— we have a bunch of people to kill, some more to humiliate… and that comes first."

"There's a certain amount of sense to that," the woman said. "Besides, neither of us has any problem satisfying our… sexual urges. I know I'm quite attractive, I can always find a bedmate, and you… well, you look a lot like that actor… what was his name? He was in Fight Club, and Panic Room, and Mr. Nobody…."

"Jared Leto," the man said. "Yeah, I planned it that way— only with the auburn hair to make me even more irresistible."

"It works," the woman admitted. Her watch chirped, and she quickly shut off the alarm, then took a small pill bottle from a pocket, dry swallowed a capsule from it. "How do these work, anyway? It's not like I have a normal metabolism."

"It's a chemical used in some nerve gasses," the man said. "Causes cell-to-cell transmission, and targets your neuro-receptors."

"Bloody genius," the woman said.

"Ah!" the man said, pointing at her. "Watch that!"

"Oh, sorry," she said. "Just… tired. Won't slip again."

"Okay," the man said. "Get some sleep— I'm gonna hit some supply shops, some stuff I ordered has come in, and I need a lot more photoelectric line. Might be able to bug the 'Scooby Mansion,' if I can make the damned microbots eyes work right. Trial and error uses up a lot of supplies, I'll tell you."

"All right," the woman said, standing and heading for her bedroom. "Find me a good place to hunt tonight, leave a note if you won't be here when I get up?"

"Will do," the man said. "Shouldn't be too bad, Mexico is a lot easier than the rest of North America. Sleep well."

"Thanks," the woman called back over her shoulder. "Good luck with your microbot things."

He waved, watched her walk away— she had a delightful ass, and a wonderfully slinky way of walking— then turned to his work until the shops opened.

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Jocelyn:

That night, I more than half expected to end up staying the night with Mi Kyong, but it didn't work out that way. Royal did stay with her (I asked, and he said he didn't mind, not when she was still in a "new place" frame of mind), and I told him to call me if she needed human company. Apparently she got by just fine, as he never called.

I stayed in Colin's room with him, and I think I surprised him with my sexual appetites. I actually wore him down, that time— mostly because I was scared of losing him. Okay, probably wouldn't happen, but still, I was fourteen and still pretty newly in love with him.

The next day, Mi Kyong came down to breakfast with Royal perched on her shoulder, and she seemed a lot more steady on her feet. Royal flew to me for a long snuggle before breakfast, and after, more of the newbie Slayers started arriving next door. Giles had two big dorm-houses over there, behind Scooby Mansion proper, and a smaller one— room for eighty girls all together, and it stayed full during the school year— so the girls would have a place to stay.

We all went over there except my brother, who was going to play mini-golf with a friend from school and his father, and I met a bunch of new girls, most of whom seemed pretty cool— but there was one in the batch that I thought of as a bad apple, and I wasn't the only one.

Sherry Plimpton was twelve, big for her age, had very Italian good looks (her mother's maiden name was DiAngelo)— and was a very obvious homophobe. She was one of three Slayers from the US that year, came from a big Mormon family in southern Idaho, and had definite issues with… well, Uncle Ballard's whole family, Willow and Lydia, and Mom, Dad and Gwendolyn. I bit my lip a lot of times that day— she didn't say anything, but I got really, really tired of her physically shying away from touching any of these people I loved.

In the end, it was Mi Kyong who said something to her, and I guess it helped… but it didn't seem like it at first.

About the third time Sherry got up and physically moved away when Aunt Rose came close to her, Mi Kyong looked at Sherry and said, "Why are you being so rude?"

Sherry had the good grace to blush, and stammer— but even I gave her points. She answered honestly.

"I was raised to believe that men loving men and women loving women— romantically, I mean— is wrong," she said (after a couple of false starts). "I'm not trying to be rude— but I don't feel comfortable around… her. Them."

"So… what would you do, make them be what they are not?" Mi Kyong asked.

"No… no, but they shouldn't just… act that way." Sherry looked helpless, then said, "They should at least keep it private."

"That is a bad way to think," Mi Kyong said. She didn't sound antagonistic, just matter-of-fact. "You ask them to hide what they feel, when what they feel is a good thing."

"You think it's a good thing," Sherry said, setting her mouth. "I don't."

"I have seen what can happen to people who love whom they please in other… places? No, cultures," Mi Kyong said. "You know where I come from?"

"You were in a prison camp in Korea, I heard," Sherry said. "Nobody said why."

"Because my father was Japanese," Mi Kyong said. "That is all."

Sherry's eyes went wide and her jaw dropped. "No way!"

"Yes," Mi Kyong said. "I was nine when I was put there, just because my father was Japanese.

"There were many in the camp for similar reasons, some for other reasons. But… Royal, would you show Sherry how I lived? Where I lived? What I ate? And… what my Japanese blood saved me from?"

Royal burbled an assent, and locked his eyes with Mi Kyong for a long moment. Then he turned and locked his eyes with Sherry Plimpton— and after a moment, she recoiled and cried aloud, "Dear god in heaven! How could they— you can't make people live like that! That's— that's not just wrong, that's— no, please, don't show me— thank you. Thank you for stopping… that. I'm sorry, I can't— that was— god!"

"Yes," Mi Kyong said. "Sherry… many people there in that camp, forced to live like… like swine, like animals, perhaps twenty percent of the inmates— including the girl that you asked not to have to see more of— were put in that camp because they were not heterosexual."

Sherry stared, wide eyed and shocked.

"Yes," Mi Kyong said. "It is true.

"That started because someone was raised to think that men loving men and women loving women— or either loving both— was wrong."

Sherry didn't say anything, just got up and walked away, went outside. Giles, ever sharp-eyed, noticed, and came over to where Mi Kyong, Colin, Rhiannon and I sat together.

"Is everything all right?" he asked. "Sherry seemed… upset."

"She's a little bit of a homophobe, Giles," I said, carefully keeping my voice neutral. "Mi Kyong called her on it— and showed her— through Royal— how homosexuals were treated back where she came from."

"Oh, dear," Giles said. "Well… yes, I'll have Kelly talk to her."

"I am sorry, Giles," Mi Kyong said. "I did not mean to cause trouble."

"No, that's quite all right," Giles said. "I would rather nip something like this in the bud than let it fester, Mi Kyong— and your approach may have a greater effect than anything I could do otherwise."

Giles went and spoke to Kelly, who rose and went outside, moving quickly but not running.

After a big "welcome home lunch" at which Sherry Plimpton was pretty subdued, but much less inclined to demonstrate her prejudices, I got "drafted" to help Buffy, Aunt Rose, Aunt Elaine and Mom show the newbies what a Slayer with a lot of training could do. Gwen was excused for pregnancy reasons— she was as healthy as a whole herd of horses, and no way exercise could hurt the baby at this stage, but an accidental blow to the womb area with Slayer power behind it, not good— and Vi and Vincent were taking their girls in for their annual checkups, so it was just the five of us.

While we did that, Diane Hodges took Colin off to a room in Scooby Mansion for the first of his therapy sessions. I kissed him and held on to him for a long moment (he was trembling just a little bit), told him to do his best to help her help him, then watched him go out of sight before letting Buffy pull me with her to the part of the yard where we'd be staging our show-off session.

We sparred, both regulation style and freeform. Aunt Rose demonstrated her sword forms (prettier by far than mine— I'm good, but she's much better), then she and I sparred with blades. We played "team sparring"— and me, Mom and Buffy barely managed to take on Aunt Rose and Aunt Elaine, who'd fought together so much that it was like fighting a four-armed, four-legged tornado that could be in two places at once. Mom and I had a target game— hitting bulls-eyes on various targets with various weapons— then played a new game, one we'd never done for an audience before, where one of us would try to hit a target with stakes, super-darts (big, Dad-created-and-made lawn-dart-sized darts with wooden points to kill vamps and steel fins to give them weight and punch), crazy-discs and knives while the other one of us tried to knock their shots off course with a bow and arrows. Mom was way better at that than me, but I did okay— and we wowed our audience to hell and gone.

"These are the kinds of things that you can learn to do," Buffy said. "Maybe not all of them, no— everyone has specialties. Rose is a goddess with a sword, Elaine can dance her way through hell without a scratch, Chantelle can throw damn near anything accurately, and Jocelyn has a better situational awareness than most anyone—"

"Except you," I said, not flattering her, just telling the truth.

"Except maybe me," Buffy conceded. "Though I'm not getting the field time I used to, and I fully expect you to pass me soon, if you haven't already.

"Point is… you can all learn to do at least some of these things. The other point is… none of you can do them yet."

This caused a vague, mutinous rumble (as it did every year), and Buffy grinned. She and Xander always came here when the girls were gathered after Activation Day, and always got this result.

"Okay… you think differently," Buffy said. "So we'll give you a shot.

"I want four volunteers to try and take down… oh, say Jocelyn here— she's close to most of you in age, closer than any of the rest of us."

I blinked in surprise— usually, Mom got this, seeing as how hand-to-hand, while she was very qualified, wasn't her specialty.

Soon enough, four of the girls were lined up in front of Buffy, including Marie, a French Slayer who moved like a dancer, Tamara, a tall, well-built Australian Aborigine girl with the blackest skin I'd ever seen and the prettiest smile of any of the newbies, Isae, a tiny little girl from Okinawa, and Berachah (pronounced beh-RAY-cha), a gentle-eyed-sweet-smiling girl from Israel. While they lined up, we got me gloves and pads, so that if I hit anyone accidentally they wouldn't be badly hurt.

"Okay, here's the rules," Buffy said. "We prefer to operate on the honor system, so if you fail to block something that, had it gotten through, would have knocked you out of the fight— not necessarily out, but left you on the ground not fighting— you step away and sit down. Remember, the people who will be teaching you to fight will be watching, and if we think you cheated and didn't sit out when you should have, that's going to color how we think of you.

"Jocelyn, if any of the four of us referees call you out, you lose. Okay?"

"Got it," I said. I bowed to my four opponents, set myself, and waited for the go signal.

"Fight!" Buffy called.

I went sideways under a really quick series of lunge punches from Isae, foot-swept her in passing, tapped her lightly on the back of her head with a back-fist as she went down, cartwheeled up and drove a carefully pulled kick into Tamara's stomach as she kicked where I'd have been if I hadn't been cartwheeling, landed in the ginga (pronounced "jinga"), the basic, back-and-forth-side-to-side movement of Capoeira, my favorite martial art. Isae and Tamara were clearing the field, Isae wide-eyed with disbelief and Tamara smiling in delighted amusement, as I pushed Marie, who was coming at me in the almost-dance-like steps of a savate fighter, back with a series of kicks, pivoting on my right foot, kicking with my left, throwing my torso down towards the ground for more speed and momentum. Marie backed into Berachah, and while they were sorting that out, I tapped a gentle kick into Marie's stomach. She went to the sidelines, and tiny, innocent, cute little Berachah gave me a hard, feral grin— and came at me with her brain fully engaged.

She moved cautiously, but not totally defensively. Her hands lashed out in short, defensive punches, her feet came in low and repeatedly, trying to trip me up, establish a counter-rhythm to my ginga, and almost doing so. I stuck with the Capoeira because Slayer power lets me pull off moves that would never work in the real world without the Slayer power, the sort of thing you see on a movie screen.

After a series of short, choppy kicks, Berachah feinted a corkscrewing double-punch, but I saw the way her feet shifted and my hindbrain saw the real attack coming, a kick for my thigh, aimed to cause a Charlie horse. I spun out of the power of her kick just as she committed to it, threw my head and torso at the ground, let the weight and momentum throw me into a sideways aerial, and swept both feet at her, one after the other. I kept my right leg pulled in, cocked to kick, let Berachah dodge my leading left foot, then kicked with the cocked right, tapping her lightly in the stomach. She laughed, threw her hands up in the air to acknowledge defeat— and when I had my feet under me, she launched herself at me in a ferocious hug.

"Wonderful, thank you!" she said in her slightly accented English. "I want to learn that, Capoeira is gorgeous!"

"You did great," I said. "You all did!"

(In fact, the first three had lasted a little less than ten seconds— and I'd needed another fifteen, almost, to nail Berachah.)

"Yes, you all did better than I expected," Buffy said. "But… better than I expected and all, you lasted less than thirty seconds against the least-trained Slayer here. I hope I made my point?"

"Oh, yeah," Tamara said, still grinning. "She's a bit of dynamite with legs on, she is. I'd hate to think what one of you more experienced types could have done to us, do ya see?"

"You're all powerful," Buffy said. "But power isn't enough. You need to learn to use it. That's why you're here, and that's why your training starts today— right now, in fact.

"Power without skill can save you— but it can very much also get you killed by any of the ten thousand types of supernatural critter who'd love to make a name for themselves by killing a Slayer.

"Rose, line them up and get them started. Berachah, Jocelyn, come here a second, please?"

Once we were far enough away from the group that not even Slayer senses could pick up what we were saying, Buffy looked at Berachah and said, "Kiddo, that was something else. I know what Jocelyn can do, and I was betting on fifteen seconds to put all four of you down. But she needed almost that long just for you. Your dad teach martial arts, or your mom?"

"Sort of," Berachah said. "My father is a close-combat instructor for the Mossad. He taught me how to take care of myself."

I whistled. Mossad is the Israeli intelligence service, like the American CIA, and their agents are supposed to be some of the scariest fighters alive.

"Okay, you get the advanced classes, with Jocelyn," Buffy said. "Jocelyn, anyone else?"

"Isae is well trained, but too traditional," I said. "She thinks in katas. Marie… she could have given me a little more of a workout, if she hadn't been too eager. I think she should have the advanced classes, too."

"All right," Buffy said. She called Marie away from the others, said, "Jocelyn says you deserve the advanced martial arts classes, Marie. You and Berachah follow her, she'll get you started."

"Oh, merci beau coup," Marie said, giving me a nervous smile. "I did not do so well, though… did I?"

"Well enough," I said. "You got too eager, is all— and I can sympathize. So come on, girls."

I went and found Dad, said, "Reporting for advanced martial arts classes, Dad."

He worked us hard, but we all three loved it.

Colin came over and watched for the last half an hour, then, with Dad's permission, he sparred me. I identified his art pretty quickly— Kenpo karate, a good, broad-based style— and he held his own better than I expected. Still, I had a clear win on points, but he didn't get mad, or even irked. He just nodded and hugged me when the class was over— and managed, through pantomime, to ask about a particular kick that I'd floored him with. I taught him the kick, then we sat down on the back porch swing behind my house, and I snuggled up to him.

"How was your session with Diane?" I asked.

He made a face that suggested strong displeasure.

"I know it has to be hard," I said. I stroked his cheek and said, "But it needs to happen. I want to hear your voice, Colin. I want to hear your voice, hear you say my name, hear you say you love me with words, not a touch."

He nodded slowly, and sighed in frustration.

"No, it's okay," I said. "I get it. I'm not saying I want to hear it right this instant, or that I'm going to blame you if I don't hear in a month, or six months, or even a year.

"Colin, you're trying. You're trying in the face of a hurt that I can barely comprehend at all, because you have a power I can barely imagine having— and I know that the consequences of using that power have to be worse than those of the Slayer power, because it's so much bigger.

"But on the flip side… Colin, you can save more people than I can, do more good. Yes, you failed, and people died. But seconds later, less than two minutes later, if you're right about how much time passed between whatever happened on your world and you coming to mine… you used that power again. You used it, and you saved my life.

"Because of that, I think… well, you aren't going to like this, maybe, but it's what I think.

"Colin, because you used your power so soon after this big failure you think you had, because you used it without hesitation to save a complete stranger… I think that on a level maybe deeper than the one where you blame yourself, maybe just above that one… I think you know that this business of blaming yourself is a mistake.

"I think that if you really, really felt you'd failed that badly all the way to the very heart of… of you, you'd have cut yourself off from that power— and I'd have died.

"So I think you'll get better. I think you'll get past this, and say what I very much want to hear— because I think you can learn consciously that whatever-it-was wasn't something you could have stopped."

For a long, long moment, Colin only stared at me. Then he gave me that tiny little smile that was the best he could manage, nodded a little and gave an elaborate shrug at the same time. I understood— he was saying, "I guess you might be right, but I can't see it right now."

"No rush, love," I said, and laid my head on his shoulder. "No rush at all."

We sat there for twenty minutes or so, then I heard someone coming and opened my eyes just as Diane sat down opposite us.

"Hello, Jocelyn, hello, Colin," Diane said. "You two look obscenely comfortable.

"Colin… may I tell Jocelyn what we talked about today? I want her to know, because we haven't gotten to anything… deep, yet, and I think she may be able to help reinforce some of the things we talked about."

Colin sat up, stared at her for a long moment, very hard, a little frown on his face. Then he pointed at me, at her, made talking noises with his hand, and raised his eyebrows.

"Yes, I want to talk to her about— what?" Diane looked confused as Colin shook his head and rolled his eyes.

Colin repeated his previous pantomime, then took my hand, put his finger on my watch, ran it counterclockwise around the face a few times. I got it, then.

"No, she hasn't talked to me about anything yet," I said.

"No, of course I haven't," Diane said. "I wouldn't, not without your permission— and when have I had the chance, anyway? Why do you ask?"

Colin blinked, thought about it for a moment, then nodded slowly and gave us both a rueful look and that tiny smile. Then he pointed at me, opened an invisible book, ran his fingers under imaginary lines of text, turned pages, did it again. Then he pointed at Diane and tapped his temple.

She got it first. "Jocelyn… read my mind? Is that what you're saying?"

Colin nodded vigorously, and Diane looked at me. "What did you say to him, Jocelyn? May I ask?"

"Of course you can ask, you're trying to help him," I scoffed. "I just said that he obviously knew on some level that whatever happened isn't really his fault, because…."

Diane listened to my reasoning with a slowly widening smile, and when I finished, she laughed— a big, hearty, happy thing.

"Sweetheart, when you get too old for Slaying, you see me for a recommendation for medical school," Diane said, grinning. "I could make you a psychiatrist in no time, and a psychologist in less time than that.

"Jocelyn, those are exactly the arguments I presented to Colin while he and I talked today."

"Really?" I asked.

"Really," Diane said, still chuckling. She stood, gave Colin a playfully hard look, and said, "There! See? It's not just me— and she's not even a trained psychologist!

"Think on that, buster!"

Colin stood and bowed deeply to her— then pulled me to my feet and kissed me, very gently but far more intensely.

Diane walked inside, still laughing, a long time before we broke our kiss.