"I was trying to save Angel's life!"
"Angel's not alive. He's a walking demon infested corpse. One that tried to kill my son, twice." One of the other men said.
"What do you mean, Mr. Harris? Angel's never hurt Xander." Willow protested.
"Teacher/parent night, the night Spike attacked the school, Angel held me immobile and offered the back of my neck to Spike. Fortunately for me, Spike was aware of the presence of the soul and realized it was a trick. When I asked Angel what he would have done if Spike took him up on the offer, he shrugged and said, then I would have known he took the bait. He didn't care if Spike killed me. Of course, neither one of them knew I had protections on me. Which came in handy during your assinine attempt to prove Faith had gone rogue."
"That was a good plan! We did find out she'd gone rogue." Buffy protested.
"I'm talking about the part where you dangled me as bait and didn't tell me. Angel knocked me unconscious and left me in the street at night. Without those protections I'd be dead or turned."
"Angel misjudged his strength, that's all, Xander. You're making too much of that." Willow protested.
"No, he's not. Vampires, especially Master vampires, are well aware of their strength and what it takes to knock out a human. After all, they don't want to kill their prey until they've had their fun with it." Tony Harris reminded them. "He simply didn't care if Xander died. And I'm being to wonder if either of you do."
"Of course we do! That's why we want him out of the Slaying. He can't protect himself!" Buffy said.
"I sure as Hell can. Better then Willow. I keep having to save your life from your own recklessness, Buffy. So where the Hell did you get the idea that I can't protect myself?!"
"Preying mantis lady. You fell for her tricks."
"That was two and half years ago. Buffy and no I didn't. That was me working undercover to draw you in so you could kill her. If you hadn't shown up, they would have killed her." Xander indicated the adults near him.
Buffy and Willow looked astonished at that revelation.
"Hyena possession!" Willow exclaimed.
"Also two and a half years ago and no more my fault then Buffy getting possessed by a ghost was."
"Swim team!"
"Went undercover to find out what was happening to the team. Which you knew. And over a year ago. Care to try again?"
"You can't, can you?" Cordelia said. "Because there's nothing else. Xander has more then proven he can take care of himself and protect others. So why do you believe otherwise?"
"Because Xander doesn't have powers, we do!" Willow said.
"People without powers are quite capable of protecting themselves. I don't have any powers and I've dusted more vampires and destroyed more demons then either one of you."
"You have, Mr. Chase?" Willow asked.
"Yes, I've known they exist since I was fifteen. I helped found this group to fight them. Aside from Rabbi Levinson's ability to create golems, we only have two Magic users in our group, Jessica Harris and Coral Maxwell." He said, indicating Xander's mother and a lovely cocoa skinned woman.
"You do Magic, Mrs. Harris?" Willow asked.
"Yes, which is why I knew you were risking your life and soul doing that insane curse. You very nearly died, Willow. If Charles hadn't convinced the world's best neurologist to come to Sunnydale, you might never have come out that coma. Mr. Giles, I really do not understand why you didn't verify Angel's claims of having a soul, let alone, investigating the curse. Curses, have out clauses, even Disney knows that, Beauty and the Beast ring a bell?!"
"Well, I guess, it didn't occur to me."
"It should have, since investigating something like that is Watchers Council policy. And Xander did suggest it, but was dismissed."
"That's because he was just jealous of Angel." Buffy said.
"No Buffy, I wasn't actually interested in you, that was just an attempt, one I gave up on fairly quickly, in order to be close to you and report to the group. I've been undercover in the Scoobies since day one. After all, we're the reason why you're even in this town. It took nearly a year to track down a Slayer, because our contact in the Watchers Council didn't know where you were and Mr. Chase offered Joyce that space for her gallery. We needed a big gun to help us fight the Mayor. Over the last two and half years, we've weakened his protections and supports by more then eighty percent. Some of that was done by aiming you at specific demons, like Machida. Defeating the Mayor wouldn't have been possible if we hadn't done that. It took a volcano to take one out before. A bomb wasn't going to cut it."
"You. You. Brought me here on purpose?!"
"Wherever you go Buffy, you're going to be fighting vampires and demon, you can't escape that. You're a magnet for them. And the Watchers Council has been ignoring the problem here for a century! Thousands have died! We had do something." Xander told her.
"But the Watchers Council didn't know about the Hellmouth." Giles protested. "I didn't know until after I got here."
Wesley looked astonished. "I was briefed on the presence of the Hellmouth before I came here. I was told you were too. The Council has been aware of it. How did you forget about that?"
"We'd like to know that too." One of the other woman said. "Along with why the three of you don't react normally to Buffy killing humans. It barely rates a ripple with any of you. Not to mention, how you managed to ignore the red flags Angel was waving in your faces. You allowed her to have a relationship with a demon under a curse. A curse that could be broken with the lessoning of suffering. A happy relationship doesn't produce suffering. And you thought they were happy together. So why didn't you ever worry about the curse breaking?"
