Reallocating Assets... (BtVS/NCIS: Los Angeles)

Disclaimer: I don't own Buffy the Vampire Slayer or NCIS: Los Angeles. They belong to Joss Whedon and Shane Brennan respectively, I think.

When Willow's temper tantrum has far-reaching effects, a watcher of a different sort comes to offer Xander and a particularly intriguing destiny all his own. Can he resist it? Will he want to?

AN: Occurs in BtVS: Post Grave; NCIS LA: Post Callen, G.

June 2nd 2002
Caritas, Los Angeles

Xander took a long pull of his sarsaparilla, grimacing at the taste. What Xander really wanted right now was a beer. His body was crying out for it with a will. Still, Xander had sworn. Xander had sworn he would never become his father. Xander was well aware that one beer would become two and that two would become three, until Xander had become a useless drunk like his father. And Xander was not about to let that happen. That was why Xander sucked it up and sipped his sarsaparilla, despite the fact that he despised the drink.

One might ask why Xander was in a bar, drinking a beverage he despised and craving a beverage he feared more then anything. One who asked such a question should really think about what had happened in Xander's life this past year.

Spike had tried to rape Buffy… Okay, that wasn't exactly ground-breaking news. Xander had long been convinced that Spike's chip-induced reform was done purely out of convenience. The sneaky monster had always been looking for a loophole and had finally found one. Buffy had been having sex with Spike… Okay, that was disgusting. It wasn't unprecedented given her relationship with Angel, but it was still disgusting. It pained him to think how low she must have been feeling to allow that monster to touch her. It galled Xander to realise that Spike had been taking advantage of Buffy right under his nose and he hadn't seen it. Still, there was a happy thought in all that misery. Buffy had finally regained enough self-respect to say no and Spike was thoroughly MIA. Okay, make that two happy thoughts. That was satisfactory as far as Xander was concerned.

Willow had gone off the deep end. His Willow… best friend since forever… had tried to end the world. Xander only thanked god, or whatever, that he had been able to talk his Willow-girl down. She was in England now, with Giles, getting some serious psychological help. Between the black magic addiction and Tara's death, Willow was not a happy puppy these days. Xander just hoped she'd come back to him in more or less one whole, Willow-shaped piece.

Xander wasn't even sure if he cared that Anya had left him. It might seem cold to many but Xander couldn't muster much worry for his ex-fiance right then. She had left him, again. She hadn't understood why he needed to stay with Buffy and Dawn. He hadn't been able to accept her return to being a vengeance demon. She had left him and he had let her go with little more then a shrug. The love of his life shattered with a shrug. Xander sometimes wondered if that was how Atlas felt.

The worst had come a few weeks after Willow's nearly world-ending hissy fit. The massive amount of magic she had displaced during her tantrum had destabilised the hellmouth's always precarious mystical balance. The resulting series of earthquakes and aftershocks had required the evacuation of the entire damn town. It had been very close. The car carrying him, Buffy and Dawn had been one of the last ones out before the whole town dropped down a massive sinkhole. Xander wasn't even sure if his parents had been sober enough at the time to evacuate.

Xander's apartment, his job and his home town were all gone in the moment Sunnydale went under. On a slightly happy note, it had taken the hellmouth with it, but it still rang sour with him. Buffy and he were currently raising Dawnie together, though their relationship was still quite platonic. Dawn was attending Hemery, much to Buffy's amusement. Buffy was working for Angel Investigations, which was a whole load of Angel-induced angst that Xander could have done without. Still, Xander appreciated that Angel was helping Buffy out.

The real laugh had been when Angel had offered Xander a job. Xander had refused outright. He appreciated the offer, he really did. The problem was that he couldn't bring himself to take orders from Deadboy. It went against Xander's grain to answer to a vampire, even one that was technically good… at the moment.

"Mr. Harris."

Xander turned around to find a positively tiny woman standing next to him. She was so tiny she made Buffy look like a giant, which was an achievement. Still, Buffy had taught him thoroughly to not judge a person by their height. "Ms. Lange, I presume."

The woman behind the large glasses smirked faintly at him. "Indeed, Mr. Harris. Do you mind if I join you?"

Xander simply motioned her to the other seat in his booth. "You been here before?" He had not gotten the impression from her message that she dealt in the supernatural.

The faint smirk became more pronounced. "Lorne is an old friend. I once took my team here to sing for him. It made for quite the evening." For some reason a shadow of sadness appeared on her face when she mentioned 'that night'. Xander supposed that the anagogic demon had seen something unpleasant.

"Speaking of your team, who do you represent? Your message just said that you might have a job opening that could benefit from someone of my talents. I'm assuming its not construction?"

A soft snort broken the silence. "Certainly not. While your construction work background is not wholly unsuitable, its certainly not the skill set that I had in mind. I represent a particular faction of NCIS." Lange smiled as she noted Xander's shoulders stiffen. "I'd wondered if you had heard of us. Trolling through footage of what happened on Halloween of 1997 was difficult and we couldn't quite figure out what kind of soldier you went as…" The woman let the question hang.

"A private in the United States Marine Corps."

The Manager of the Office of Special Projects smiled slightly. "I'd thought so. Something about the walk just screamed marine. It also explains your little culture clash with Finn and his merry band…"

Xander frowned deeply at the dissertation. "You'll forgive me if I'm not thrilled that you've been watching us and not helping at all."

The woman shrugged, looking not the least bit apologetic. "I make no apologies, Mr. Harris. Most of the information I get on you is studied after everything is over, and even if it weren't I have no jurisdiction in those matters."

"Neither do I, and it never stopped me."

The smile reappeared. "Not much of anything seems to stop you, Mr. Harris. You've heard of NCIS, have you ever come across the Office of Special Projects?"

Xander's mild hostility was replaced with curiosity. "I can't say that I have."

"Good, then my people are doing their jobs. What I would like to do is recruit you to join us. As I said, your skill set is quite impressive…"

The so-called Zeppo did not allow anything to show this time. "Which skill set would that be, exactly?"

Ms. Lange just smiled benignly. "In point of fact… There is your knowledge of the supernatural, your more then reasonable marksmanship, your knowledge of firearms and explosives, your ability to work under the radar of local law enforcement, your ability to blatantly lie and bluff at the drop of the hat, your courage and the fact that you are not mystically augmented in any way."

"I take it that you're some sort of super-covert arm of NCIS then?"

"I can neither confirm nor deny such a thing, Mr. Harris. At least not until you sign on with us."

"Why is mystical augmentation a bad thing exactly?"

"Two reasons, Mr. Harris. The first is that mystical augmentations tend to make one stick out or to inconvenience one. A slayer is too strong and sticks out because of it. A werewolf suffers from that time of the month and is unavailable because of it. I could go on…"

"No need. The second reason?"

"The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away, Mr. Harris. Any advantage given mystically can be counteracted either by the nature of the advantage or by other methods. We prefer to rely on the proven base ability of the ordinary human."

"It's Xander, Ms. Lange."

"I think not, Mr. Harris. I prefer to call you by your name."

"Alexander, then?"

"I suppose that will do."

"Then I suppose you've got a deal, Ms. Lange."

The woman smiled again, this one seeming more genuine then any other before it. "You never protested your ability to lie and bluff. Most people take offence at that."

Xander shrugged. "I'm assuming, since you've been watching me for several years from the sounds of things, that you know what you are talking about."

"Indeed I do. I'm not sure what I considered more impressive, you staring down that zombie over a ticking bomb or the rather impressive pile of manure that you shoveled on that poor lad guarding the Sunnydale Armoury…"

A smirk greeted her in response to that comment. "I personally prefer the zombie incident. I wasn't aware that a zombie could practically piss himself with fear before then. It was incredibly satisfying to be the one inducing the terror for once."

The woman nodded amiably. "I can readily imagine in that line of business, Alexander. You are to report to this address, 7:30 sharp." She slid a business card across the table to him. "The password will be Nighthawk."

Xander glanced up at her as the woman got up. He found he really didn't want to know how she had discovered that name. "I'll be there."

Ms. Lange stopped at the door of Lorne's establishment. "Alexander?"

The man who would soon be known as Special Agent Harris met her gaze unflinchingly. "Yes, Ms. Lange?"

"Call me Hetty."

NCIS: Los Angeles is sadly underrepresented so far, especially considering how close LA is to Sunnydale. It's time to change that... ;)

Anyone who'd like to pick up this plot please drop me a line via the reviews and it'll be all yours.

Jasper