"That could have gone better," Buffy said with a sigh. "You alright?"
"Thankfully I was wearing my helmet," Xander teased.
The overturned SUV behind them exploded, drawing their attention for a moment before they both turned back around and kept walking.
"It rolled much too easily," Buffy complained.
"It wasn't made for turning sharply at those kinds of speeds," Xander told her, lacing his fingers through hers and swinging their joined hands.
"I wasn't going that fast," Buffy said, "I only had the pedal halfway down."
"That's why you have to look at the speedometer," Xander said, "not measure speed by how far down the pedal is."
"All the way down should match the speed limit," Buffy said, "why would they design it otherwise?"
"That's not how that works," Xander said as they continued on to the gold mine.
"Are you sure?" Buffy asked. "I mean, we were still going pretty slow as far as I could tell."
"Yes, I'm sure," Xander said. "Cars go several times the speed limit on the highways, much less in town."
"Why?" Buffy asked.
"In case of emergency," he replied.
"That makes sense," she grudgingly admitted.
"Don't worry about it," he told her, "there are plenty more vehicles to practice on."
"I can do it again?! You really don't mind?!" she asked excitedly.
"Hopefully you won't do that again, but yes since I love you, that means I'll get into another car with you after you crashed and burned the last one," he told her.
"You are so getting a perk tonight, possibly several," Buffy told him.
Xander just grinned.
"So... how do gold mines work?" she asked as they continued up the winding mountain road, enjoying the peace and quiet.
"People dig gold out of them," Xander replied with a shrug, "that's pretty much the beginning and end of my gold mining knowledge."
"Same," she replied. "Think it's like diamond mines where they chip diamonds out of stone?"
"Probably, they've gotta separate them somehow," Xander said.
"I know when they get them from rivers they use pans and water to get little shiny bits," Buffy offered.
"It's a metal so maybe they just heat up the rocks until the gold drips out," Xander said.
"Would that work?" she asked as they came to a large gate blocking off the road with 'Sagebrush Mine and Refinery' on it and a pair of guard posts.
"I wondered where all the zombies went," Xander said, forgetting her question as two zombies in guard uniforms mindlessly tried to walk through the chain-link fence.
Buffy gestured and they both fell down with broken necks. "I thought refineries were for turning oil into gas?"
"Well, unless oil being called black gold means you find them both in the same place, I'm guessing it also refers to turning rocks into gold," he said, crouching down and leaping over the fence.
Buffy crouched down and leapt over it as well, landing next to him. "This looks more like a construction site than a place I'd expect to find gold."
"Mining is a bit similar or at least construction involved in making big holes in the ground," Xander said with a shrug.
The pair wandered through the facility quickly discovering that mining gold apparently involved crushing rock before sorting the ground up rock using water somehow before melting and refining the remains into ingots.
"Lots of dirt... no actual gold," Buffy said once they'd finished examining the grounds and killing at least two dozen more zombie guards.
"No reason to keep gold here after you've finished making it into bars," Xander said with a sigh. "Too bad, I thought this place would be a gold mine for us."
Buffy snickered.
Xander chuckled. "Yeah, you know what I mean."
"I do," she agreed. "Well, this is a bust, let's find a car and head for the next town."
"Fine, but remember, keep to the speed limit, don't floor it," he told her firmly.
Buffy rolled her eyes. "It was just one little SUV."
"Oh, I didn't mind that," Xander said, waving off the wrecked vehicle that was probably still merrily burning at the turn to reach the mine, "I'm more worried about us getting injured. We may be tough, but we're not immortal."
"I'll be careful," Buffy promised.
Ten Minutes Later
"I totally forgot that was there," Buffy said as Xander kicked his door, tearing it completely off the wrecked truck and telekinetically pulled her out, her clothes vanishing as he did so.
"I'm just going to chalk this one up to bad luck," Xander said as he walked away from the two wrecked vehicles as the truck slowly caught fire.
"You are being very understanding," Buffy noted as she floated alongside Xander.
"And you are being very naked," he replied with a grin.
"I thought it might cheer you up and get me out of the doghouse," she offered, posing as if she were a playboy model.
Xander laughed. "I think you are more upset than I am and just so you know, nudity will not work on me forever."
"How long do you think it'll work?" she asked curiously.
"A century at most," he said thoughtfully, "maybe longer."
"Yes!" Buffy fist pumped, doing interesting things to her torso.
"Okay, maybe two," Xander admitted with a grin as he began to jog and then to run, quickly passing the speed they'd been driving at.
"Are you going to put me down?" Buffy asked after a minute had passed.
"Nope, I get stronger the more I push myself, so I figured you'd fly air Xander while I run," he replied.
"The Broken Limiter perk," Buffy said thoughtfully. "That works on everything?"
"It does," Xander agreed.
Buffy grinned and a bottle of sunscreen appeared in her hand which she slowly began applying everywhere, drawing Xander's attention.
"What are you up to?" he asked suspiciously.
"Up to something?" Buffy asked innocently. "What could I possibly be up to?" She began applying sunscreen to her inner thighs.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
"Huh," Sully said, pulling a DVD case labeled 'The Grounding of Group Six' off the shelf.
"Find something interesting?" Ludi asked, feeling shock flooding through her boyfriend's being even though he didn't show any outward response.
"I think we should get everyone to watch this," Sully said, showing her the cover of the case which displayed them and their friends standing together.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
"I can't believe my mom knew about all of this and didn't tell me," Willow complained. "Even worse, she told me it was unimportant while using it all herself!"
Cordelia examined her nails critically before using an emery board on one.
"We're women, beauty is one of our main tools for manipulating our environment," Cordelia replied.
"What about men?" Dawn asked. "I've seen some very pretty men."
"It's one of their tools as well, it's just secondary to competence," she said. "Give me a competent ugly man over a pretty idiot any day. I'd rather have competent and pretty of course, but you can't always get what you want."
"That sounds so wrong," Willow said, examining her nails.
"Life is hard, it's easier if you're intelligent and pretty," Cordelia said with a shrug, "I didn't design it so I have to put up with it and pretending life is anything but what it is, isn't very intelligent, now is it?"
"I'm disturbed by how often I find myself agreeing with you," Willow said.
"You'll get used to it," Cordelia replied with such confidence that would have horrified Willow if she didn't have Stress Defense.
"Do you think Xander would like me better as a blonde?" Dawn asked.
"Buffy already has the bleach blonde thing going on," Cordelia said, "and I think you look better as a brunette, though it's light enough we could give you some red highlights that would look fantastic."
"Xander already loves you the way you are," Willow told her, "why would you change anything?"
"You're changing things," Dawn pointed out.
"I'm just polishing what I have," Willow said. "I want to make him drool."
"I want him to drool too," Dawn said, looking down at her chest and sighing.
"Relax," Cordelia told her, "you obviously take after your mom more than Buffy does and she has good genes, just wait a year or two to develop properly and you're golden."
Dawn sighed. "I hate waiting."
"Meh," Cordelia waved it off. "We all hated waiting, but we all had to do it. You'll hate more missing what you've got."
"Huh?"
"You'll only be whatever age you're at right now for a little while, use it to get away with what you can," Cordelia said. "When I was around your age, I was so downright adorable I could have gotten away with murder. And do you know how many corpses I made? None! Waste of my early teens is what it was."
Dawn and Willow stared at her in disbelief before noticing her grin and bursting out laughing.
"But seriously don't bother being impatient, it's a waste of time because there is always something to look forward to," Cordelia said with a shrug.
"That's true," Willow agreed. "I'm still working my way up to things I can do with Xander and I intend to enjoy every one of them."
"Maybe I am being a little impatient," Dawn admitted, "it's just I've had so much happen lately. Xander is now an agent of some company so powerful that goddesses are only worth like a third of his sign-on bonus and while my parents are still my parents, I'm also a Roman Goddess... but still a teenager."
"You're a goddess?" Cordelia asked in disbelief.
"Roman Goddess of Transformations, Transportation, and Translations," Dawn said. "Daughter of Janus and no idea. I just know Janus is my father. He's the one who powered the Halloween spell."
Cordelia looked over at Willow who nodded. "Get any awesome powers from it? Wait! Is that how you knew I needed to calm down? Sprouting wings is transforming, I think."
Dawn frowned in thought. "Maybe? It just seemed kinda obvious."
"Any idea what the glowing hands thing is about?" Cordelia asked hopefully.
"Well," Dawn considered it, "Xander gave you a baton to go with it... Have you thought about trying to make the baton glow with it?"
"Interesting idea," Cordelia said, summoning the baton to her hand.
"Maybe you should try it on something else, just to make sure it doesn't explode or anything," Willow suggested.
"What do you suggest?" Cordelia asked.
Willow grabbed her backpack and dug around a second before coming up with a wooden stake. "This."
"You actually carry wooden stakes on you?" Cordelia asked, accepting the stake.
"Hard to stake vampires without them," Willow replied.
"I thought Buffy and Xander did all the fighting," Cordelia admitted.
"Buffy did most of it, being the Slayer and all," Willow said, "but me and Xander helped when we could if only in playing distraction or carrying extra stakes, unfortunately we often ended up fighting. I say unfortunately because vampires are about four to five times as strong and fast as humans."
"How did you survive?" Cordelia asked, shocked.
"Buffy is very skilled as well as being stronger and faster than the vampires, so we mostly just had to hold them off using holy water and crosses," she explained.
"That's still... beyond impressive," Cordelia said.
"It was beyond terrifying, but it had to be done," Willow replied.
"Yeah, 'end of the world' may have been mentioned," Cordelia replied, remembering half overheard conversations.
"We also did it to keep the number of vampires low," Willow said. "That's kind of important as it helps keep the school obituary section small," she added.
"I've actually noticed that," Cordelia said thoughtfully. "It's been getting pretty small since Buffy got here."
"And of course, sometimes it was just for fun," Willow admitted.
"What?"
"Sometimes we'd just go out for no other reason than we could hang out together, sneak through cemeteries filled with monsters, and dust them," Willow said with a grin. "Our hearts would beat a mile a minute and we might accidentally brush up against each other... it made everything feel more alive, you know?"
"Holy shit," Cordelia said numbly, "you guys... that's so beyond hardcore... but at school you were all like Miss Innocent!"
"At school I'm dealing with human beings, we aren't allowed to stake those, not to mention they aren't just demons pretending to be human," Willow said. "True monsters are rare, even among the monsters sometimes, but vampires... there are no doubts or questions when it comes to them."
"You and Xander are a lot more alike than I thought," Dawn said. "If Xander was killed, how much of Sunnydale would you destroy?"
"I'm not nearly as indiscriminate as he is," Willow defended herself, "I'm pretty sure I could find and kill whatever harmed him just taking out a single city block."
"Are you saying that to be truthful or because you don't want to freak us out?" Dawn asked suspiciously.
"I'm hoping it's more of the first one, but it's probably at least a little of the second one," Willow admitted. "I mean, I'd like to think I'd be more restrained than Xander would but... It'd be so easy to cause damage on a scale the state would have to call for disaster relief."
"And on that not at all terrifying note let's change the subject," Cordelia said with faux cheer and a fake smile. "How do I do that thing with this?"
"Do the finger thing but to it," Dawn said, "and be prepared for wings."
"Alright," Cordelia said as she concentrated on the stake which instantly took on a golden glow as wings sprouted from her back. "Huh, that was easy."
"Poke a cushion," Dawn suggested, holding up a throw pillow.
Cordelia poked the pillow with the glowing wooden stake. "Nothing's happening."
"I wonder what it would do to a vampire," Willow said thoughtfully.
"Kinda want to find out, kinda don't want to die," Cordelia said honestly.
"Willow?" Dawn asked with a grin.
"A small patrol would probably be safe enough," Willow admitted. "We could go to the Bronze and make sure I could handle a vampire or two first of course."
"I'm in the dark here," Cordelia said dryly, her wings lighting up the room along with the glowing stake.
"I'm as strong and fast as a vampire and can probably lift your car with my mind. How do you feel about hunting vampires to find out what you can do?" she challenged.
Typing By: Abyssal Angel
Beta By: Abyssal Angel and Mist of Shadows