Professor Dormer had just been informed of the Watchers Council's attempt to administrator the Cruciamentum test to Buffy. She wasn't taking the news well.
"What the Hell were you thinking, Mr. Giles!" The teenagers could hear her ranting from outside the library. "Participating in that vile ritual! Your own grandmother wrote a report condemning that vile atrocity. And as for you, Quentin Travers, if you dare to come near my Faith with that poison, you will find yourself treated with a shotgun up your ass!"
"Calm down, Ms. Dormer, your behavior is very unseemly!"
"It's Professor Dormer of Harvard. And I may be a Boston Brahmin, but I am also an American. This is how we express ourselves when we are pissed off! Or did that little thing called the Revolutionary War, not teach you English, that?! You go back to England while you still have a position with the Council and you do not return. Do you understand me? I suspect the real reason you decided at this time to administer the Cruciamentum to Buffy Summers, is to determine if another Slayer will even be called. It's unlikely given that the Essence has moved on from her, but you were willing to gamble with her life, in the hopes of getting another Slayer. One you hoped to be able to control. Faith would no more listen to you, then Miss Summers would!"
"The Slayer must be controlled. That is too much power in the hands of a child!"
"No, the Elders have made it clear and I agree, they must be guided. Witches grow up in the company of their families and covens. Most are stable, well adjusted individuals. Slayers who know love and care are as well. Faith is as much my child as she would be if I bore her, myself. I would die for her. And if necessary, I would kill to protect her. Not because she's the Slayer, but because I love her. Do as the whitelighter suggested Quentin Travers, get out of Sunnydale before we run you out!"
As she exited the library Professor Diana Dormer could see five teenagers, Faith, Cordelia, Xander, Willow and Oz. Xander raised his hands and began a slow clap, with smiles, the rest did so as well.
"Professor Dormer, I can safely say, you are the kind of woman I find most attractive. Strong, smart and kick ass!" Xander said.
"Then it's probably a good thing I'm old enough to be your mother, because I think you're rather adorable, myself. Faith, I feel the need for an ice cream, what about you?"
"Yeah, I could go for some chocolate mint, right about now." A phone could be heard ringing, just as Quentin Travers came out the library and glared at them all. "Civilians. None of you should be here. You shouldn't even be involved. Having friends is distracting to the Slayer's mission."
"The choice to fight evil is an individual choice. No one has any right or say in keeping someone from making that choice for themselves." Xander told him. "And Slayers aren't emotionless weapons, they're human beings, just like witches are. Distractions and off duty time, make them more productive, not less. Anyone with a brain can tell you that. But you know that, which is part of why you try to limit them. Why you go behind their parents backs if you can't foster them like Professor Dormer is Faith. Because it makes them so much easier to control. That's why eighteen is the age you use for your so called test. If they've managed to survive to eighteen, they start to question. And you don't want questions, because it threatens your perceived authority."
"He is correct." Giles said, as he came out of the library. "Mr. Travers, that phone call was from Allen Cranston, Head of the High Council of Watchers. You are being recalled immediately. You did not have orders to administer the Cruciamentum, in fact, when you proposed the idea, you were threatened with sanctions. I suspect Professor Dormer is correct in her belief that you were attempting to see if a new Slayer would be Called. Perhaps you thought the Council would see a benefit in killing and reviving Potentials in the hopes of having more Slayers to fight evil."
"Fighting evil with evil, doesn't work, Mr. Travers." Xander said. "It just makes you evil too. You have half an hour until sunset. After that, the only thing that will ensure you survive the night, is our sense of duty. Which fortunately for you, is quite strong."
"How did they find out so soon?"
"The whitelighter that was here? He's my whitelighter." Xander told him. "But he's also the Halliwell witches whitelighter. When he requests an audience with the Elders, he's not kept waiting."
"The Halliwell's? And how do you rate a whitelighter, let alone one also assigned to the Halliwell's?"
"I'm a born whitelighter, in the process of manifesting my abilities. Which makes me one of them. And I was born and raised in Sunnydale. You can understand why they'd think I needed special attention."
"A born whitelighter? You did not report this, Mr. Giles."
"Because it's my business, not the Watchers Council's. You're down to twenty five minutes, Mr. Travers."
Fortunately for Quentin Travers, he and his fellow Watchers, who had accompanied him to Sunnydale, hadn't had time to begin setting up their little surprise for Buffy. Fortunately for the mothers of Sunnydale, Faith and the others escorted him back to the other Watchers and discovered the crazy vampire that they'd been planning to use as part of the test. Faith dusted his crazy ass and with another glare, Quentin Travers departed Sunnydale and was never seen there again.
"Giles, we need your help to understand the demons we deal with, but you have no more authority with us." Xander told him. "Beyond the authority you have as a nominal teacher at our school. We've discussed this and we agree. We can't trust you. I honestly don't see how you could have expected Buffy to continue to trust you if you'd done the Cruciamentum test on her. Forgiveness would be far too difficult after a betrayal like this. But if you ever betray any of us or worse, get any of us killed , you may just find yourself with that shotgun up your ass. Am. I. Being. Clear?" Xander said to Giles afterward.
"Yes."