"This would be a great job if not for all the paperwork," Xander muttered, snagging a donut as he examined the stack of forms he had to fill out.
"I know how you feel," Detective McKay said as he joined him in the breakroom, "but we need solid records of everything we witness and do to make sure we aren't overstepping our authority and have the right perp."
"Yes, however my paperwork deals with my qualifications and what I hoped to accomplish with my lecture and how I think it went," Xander said, "and considering the topic... I'm pretty sure they're just going to write me off as a random crazy or prankster, not that I mind. As long as you guys take me seriously and learn how to handle things I'll be happy."
"Trust me, we all learned something from that lecture," Detective McKay said, "and even if the brass doesn't believe it, I'll make sure a recording of it circulates through all the precincts."
"Vampires don't show up on film unless they are wearing all new clothes, because it takes a little time for their corruptive influence to... corrupt them, so they don't cast reflections," Xander said with a frown. "If I'd thought about it I'd have had the dust bunny wearing new threads. The cuffs should be visible and sound will be fine though."
"How in the hell did you figure that out?" he asked. "According to your lecture, vamps rarely change clothes."
"Spike, or William the Bloody, which is actually short for William the Bloody Awful Poet, is a Master Vampire which means he can actually make plans beyond 'get a bunch of minions and jump them'," Xander explained, "and when faced with... someone he isn't sure he can take in a fight, he'll throw minions at them while having another minion nearby record it. To make that work he needs his minions to show up on video, so he figured it out."
"And he just told you about it?"
"He's a vampire and, Master or not, he has a huge ego, so when I saw some of his tapes I asked and he was perfectly happy to brag about what a genius he was," Xander replied.
"So, a vampire in brand new clothes, fed with fresh blood, can pass for human even if you know the signs?"
"When the demon sets up shop in the corpse, it makes a few alterations," Xander said, "it improves the looks to help them hunt and alters the eyes so they can see in the dark. If someone looks a little too perfect and has a jewel-like gloss to their eyes, they are probably a vampire. Some are better at faking being human than others, but there are always ways to pick them out of a crowd."
"Experience and knowledge coming together in a gut instinct?" Detective McKay asked, but almost making it a statement, which wasn't surprising because of the amount of police work that required going with your gut.
"Exactly," Xander agreed. "I have a couple of friends who can reliably pick them out of a crowd just because of their fashion sense alone. Thankfully most vamps suck at being subtle."
The Detective nodded and started on his own stack of paperwork, the two falling silent as they sacrificed a good quarter of an hour to the gods of bureaucracy.
"And done," Xander said with a grin. "No doubt they'll probably file all of it in the circular file cabinet, but my part is over with."
"Where you off to next?"
"Nowhere in particular," Xander replied. "This is my summer vacation after all."
"This is what you do on vacation? I'd hate to see what your work week is like," the Detective said.
"Keep track of everyone who died or went missing, stake vampires, make sure no one is trying to open a portal to Hell or similar," Xander replied with a shrug. "Rinse, repeat for each week so thank God for the summer lull when all the demons go on vacation or hibernate so we can relax."
"Life just keeps getting weirder," he said.
"Tell me about it," Xander said with a grin and stood up. "Well, see you around."
The Detective waved as Xander left and an older man took a seat across from him. "Sergeant Myers," he greeted him. "Any problems?"
"No, though the... creature," his face wrinkled in disgust, "that Mr. Harris brought with him is almost completely transparent on the recordings."
"It was only the fresh blood and handcuffs that allowed him to show at all," Detective McKay said. "Apparently they corrupt things they are in contact with, so they don't have a reflection or show up on recordings."
"Well, the audio is fine and since that thing is see through you can actually watch Mr. Harris stake him if you pay close attention," Sergeant Myers said. "You'll have to watch it at least twice to catch it though."
"Twice?" he asked.
"Yeah, Harris doesn't change expression or even pause in his steps, his arm just flicks out, a stake coming to hand that he nails him with like he was pushing a button, before slipping the stake back up his sleeve," Sergeant Myers explained. "First time you see it you won't notice because his body language distracts you, it's hard to describe."
"Vampires are fast and have enhanced senses, any telegraphed move would be blocked," Detective McKay guessed.
"Yeah, that makes sense, but it's still something you'll have to see to believe. We had to slow down playback to get the full picture."
"Think he's got superpowers?"
"He's got something alright," the sergeant said. "Watching the playback, you can see he never takes his attention off the creature and the creature knows it. The few times it looked like it was preparing to move, Harris forced it to calm down. Like when you showed your back to it."
Detective McKay paled. "Shit, I hadn't considered it a threat at that point. Never doing that again."
"Not more than once anyway," Sergeant Myer said pointedly.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
"Something interesting?" Tod asked his partner as she seemed absorbed in the reports she was reading.
"A request for information from several agents both on and off the books from half a dozen contacts in both law enforcement and the other side, on one Alexander Harris," Pearl replied.
"Alexander Harris," the agent muttered, leaning back in his chair. "Doesn't ring a bell."
"I'd be surprised if it did," she replied. "He's a high school student, or was, having recently graduated from Sunnydale Highschool in California."
"Sunnydale, Mayor turned into a giant snake and was blown up by the Justice League, releasing a spell that kept the town all but completely isolated from the outside world?" he asked.
"It caught your interest, did it?" she asked with amusement.
"Just a bit," he replied. "A town set up like an antlion trap to lure in and devour people sounds like a Stephen King novel and I'm curious how the people are going to adapt to suddenly being in a world full of aliens and superheroes," he explained.
"That is an interesting question," she agreed. "Well, I can tell you how one of their recent High School graduates is adapting."
"Yeah?" he asked, leaning forward in his chair.
"Yeah," she repeated with a smirk. "He's been dealing with supernatural problems and providing lectures to the police on how to spot and handle them."
"I knew Sunnydale was identified as a supernatural hotspot, but a high school student developed those sets of skills?" he asked in disbelief.
"I've got two recorded lectures and three sets of police reports that identify him as the one who resolved local issues," she said.
"Send me a copy or I'm going to read over your shoulder," he told her.
"Grab a notepad and get over here," she told him. "I want a second set of eyes on it."
Tod chuckled. "You just want to control the playback, so I have to help you form an opinion on what sections you find important."
"Yes, yes I do," she agreed as he grabbed a legal pad and pen.
Three Hours Later
"The freshly turned teen was visible, though a little hard to see while the one he brought up on stage was completely transparent," Pearl noted thoughtfully. "Any theories as to why?"
"Age? Knowing he was being filmed? They may have a power that requires practice to use," Tod replied.
"I have a lot of questions, though I have to admit he answered a lot of them in his lectures," she said, leaning back in her chair.
"He was concentrating on the practical," Tod told her. "He rarely wandered off what information they would find useful for dealing with the problem."
"He had a lot of practical knowledge, but considering he said he'd been hunting them since he was fifteen, I suppose that shouldn't come as a surprise," Pearl decided, pulling on her left earlobe as she considered things.
"You want to pick his brain for all the things he didn't go into," Tod said, amused.
"I do," she realized. "You?"
"Yeah, his practical knowledge was just this side of amazing, I want to know what else he knows," the agent agreed. "I've been at this job for years and I still learned quite a lot just from his lecture."
"He doesn't carry a cell phone or use credit cards," she complained. "He's a lot more difficult to track than our average suspect and he's not even trying."
"He's in San Francisco as of yesterday and isn't trying to cover any large distances while he plays tourist," Tod said. "Since he makes a habit of taking care of problems and is actually polite enough to fill out paperwork for the police, we just need to go there and wait."
"I did always want to see the 'Ripley's Believe it or Not' museum at the wharf," she said with a grin.
"Just don't try and claim it on our expense report," he told her. "There are limits to what the folks upstairs will accept."
"What? It's practically required," she teased. "We never know what we might find, so any report of the unusual, commonly known or not, must be checked out."
"You tried to claim tickets to Disneyland to see the Haunted Mansion on your expense account," he reminded her.
"There are a lot of stories about Disney," she defended herself. "Besides, they approved it after I got confirmation about actual human bones being used on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride."
"Stop picking a fight with the bean counters, it never ends well," he chided her.
"How is it you get away with your ridiculous claims like always going to Starbucks, but I don't?" she demanded.
"I speak bureaucrat," he replied smugly. "I'm not drinking overpriced coffee; I'm taking over the counter stimulants to make up for lack of sleep and maintain my alertness."
She just stared at him in disbelief.
He smiled smugly and sipped his Grande cappuccino.
"Do you think we'll discover him in the middle of another supernatural situation?" she asked. "For someone on vacation he does more work than most agents."
"He grew up surrounded by supernatural creatures that consider people food and once he was consciously aware of them, he started to hunt them," Tod replied. "He's now stepped out into the world where the vast majority of people don't recognize the signs of them. The Justice League may handle major alien and demonic incursions but low-level threats that chip away at the population are beneath their notice for the most part, however they're not beneath his. I expect he's subconsciously drawn to demonic activity, knowing the signs, and is driven to wipe them out."
"Already running a profile on him?" she asked.
"Preliminary only, half guesswork at best," he admitted. "I don't have enough hard data for more at the moment, but his actions speak for themselves."
"Are you sure he's not actively hunting them?" she asked.
Tod was silent for a moment before saying, "It's possible, but not likely, too much improvisation in the way of weapons and actions. Rather than arming himself in advance and making deliberate plans he acted on impulse grabbing anything he could use in the area, not to mention there being no links between the situations he's been involved in. My gut says he's either drawn to situations where these creatures lurk or he has bad luck to the level it could be considered a superpower."
"Ouch," Pearl said, wincing.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
"You seem nervous,"
"Ack!" Xander clutched his shield to his chest. "Don't do that, I'm fragile."
She chuckled in amusement. "Weak heart?" she guessed.
"Hence the shield," Xander joked, taking in the long-haired brunette with blue eyes who was just an inch shorter than him and as beautiful as any Slayer.
"You follow Thor?" she guessed as she looked over the shield he was carrying and noted it had seen some use recently.
"No, picked it up in a museum while stopping a human sacrifice," he replied, while scanning the crowds nervously.
"Really?" she asked, detecting no lie.
"Yeah, it's a reproduction they had on display," he said, relaxing a little, "and it's really come in handy."
"Are you expecting trouble?" she asked.
"I hope not, I brought my shield because I need some work done on it," Xander said, "and what better place than a gathering of blacksmiths and armorers showing off their skills?"
"And the nervousness?"
"Avoiding Wonder Woman," he said bluntly.
"Really?" she asked with a grin.
"Really," he replied, "I may have upset a couple of Greek Goddesses with thoughtless actions as a teen, so..."
"Oh," she said, "I can see where you'd avoid her then. How did you upset them?"
"Do you really want to hear about my awkward adolescent fumbling in love and witchcraft? Oh, and add a third goddess probably because me and magic don't mix," he added, wondering if he'd also pissed off Hecate at some point.
"You've made me curious," she said.
"Curious enough to go out for a coffee?" he asked hopefully. "Chocolate chip cookies and cocoa help me cope with the shame."
"Sure," she agreed, "I'll even spring for the big cookie."
"My hero," Xander said, before frowning. "I'm being rude, I asked you on a date without even getting your name."
She offered a hand. "Diana Prince."
He shook her hand, noting the strength in her grip. "Alexander Harris." He waved to a medieval themed Starbucks that had been set up for the event. "Shall we?"
"We shall," she agreed with a smile.
Typing By: Abyssal Angel
Beta By: Abyssal Angel, Mist of Shadows, and Kyrin Fireheart
AA: Oh hell, that's where you end it?! Evil Evil Dogbert, EVIL!