Title: With Larry's Luck

Author: Jeanny

Feedback: Please. jeannygrrl@hotmail.com

Distribution: I don't mind, just credit me and let me know where it's going.

Rating: PG

Spoilers: Season 3 Through The Wish

Disclaimer: I own no one and nothing, especially the characters in this story. I'm merely borrowing them for the pure pleasure of messing with their lives.

Summary: A little Anyanka vignette that takes place between The Wish and Doppelgangland.

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"D'Hoffryn! D'Hoffryn!" Anyanka squealed, slamming her locker shut and ignoring the startled and curious stares from the mortal children around her. Before her power center was destroyed, she had merely needed to focus her thoughts on the other realm. Clearly now more elaborate supplications were required, but it had been more than a thousand years. She no longer remembered the necessary rituals, and she was beyond panic.

"No, no, no, this isn't happening. This can't be happening. It's...it's a horrifying illusion of my worst fears made real, the kind that appears in sleep..." Of course, she hadn't slept in a thousand years. Demons required no such respite, having only to escape to other realms. Yet the alternative, that this was real, was certainly unthinkable.

Snarling in frustration, she turned without looking and ran into an all too solid object in her path. Two beefy hands grabbed onto her shoulders with surprising gentleness, steadying her. Anyanka looked up and saw one of those mortal boys that were all lumpy from playing sports. She glared up at him in annoyance as he smiled down at her.

"A nightmare?" Larry offered gently. She recognized him now; this was one of those who had fought off the vampires in the glorious new world she had created. The one in which her power center had been destroyed. Anyanka clenched her fists so tight her nails dug angry red trenches in her palms.

"What?" Anyanka snapped. The giant boy shrugged.

"The word you were looking for just now. Nightmare?" he said again, earning only another look that had once brought mortal men to their knees in fear. Instead he looked at her in pity. "Look, something's obviously wrong. Can I help?"

Anyanka instantly hated this boy with the intensity only a vengeance demon could muster. She would curse his tongue to blacken, his hair to fall out, his...his shorts to tighten...she opened her mouth...

...and burst into tears. The boy looked a bit overwhelmed, but he wrapped his arms around her in attempted comfort anyway. After a moment of resistance she sobbed into his shirt.

"Hey..." he said in bewilderment. "Hey, there, you..."

"Anya..." she hiccupped.

"Right, Anya...whatever it is, it can't be that bad."

"Not that bad! Not that bad!" Anya shrieked, pushing her way out of his arms. "In over a thousand years of existence, this is beyond comparison the worst thing that has ever happened to me! I can't believe it's gone."

"What's gone?"

"My necklace! What am I going to do without my necklace?"

"That's what this is all about? You lost a piece of jewelry? Did you check the Lost and Found?"

"It's not lost, it's gone. It's gone!" she answered, pounding her fists ineffectually against his chest. Larry easily grabbed her hands. He wondered why he was spending so much time trying to help this strange girl. He decided it was equal parts trying to make up for some truly piggish behavior of his in the past, and an overwhelming desire to find out where she had gotten those precious rhinestone earrings.

"Okay, easy there...is it really valuable? You think someone stole it?"

Anyanka blinked at him wearily, shaking her head. The fight had gone out of her, and now she just felt exhausted. Something else she hadn't experienced in a millennium.

"It's only valuable to me. It's like...you wouldn't understand," she finished slowly.

A light dawned in Larry's eyes, and he reached into his pocket, fishing around for something.

"I think I understand better than you think. It brings you luck, right?"

"It brings me everything," Anyanka said fervently.

"And you're worried about the math quiz this afternoon," Larry guessed, his fingers finally closing on his prize possession.

"I'm...math...what?" Anya blinked. "Oh God...I forgot about the math quiz." Fresh fear brought a new round of anger. "My God, what kind of sick place is this? Sure, everyone says, you gotta see the Hellmouth, it's great for vengeance, but then you get here and it's all stupid flighty girls that can't even wish right and math and..." she trailed off as Larry held out his hand with a smile.

"You lost your lucky necklace. Look, I know how that can mess you up, just...here."

The Slayer darted into the hallway, drawn by the most bloodcurdling screams she had ever heard. Buffy looked around frantically for something remotely demonic, but all she saw was Larry, standing alone and looking bemused.

And holding a rabbit's foot key chain.

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