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Out of Africa
by spikeNdru
Genre: Gen; Action/Adventure
Pairings: Xander and Ensemble; no pairings yet.
Rating: PG-13
Timeline: Two years post-Chosen
Disclaimers: The characters belong to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy and 20th Century Fox; they aren't currently using them so I'm borrowing them for awhile.
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Chapter Four
Dawn wasn't asleep when Xander and Willow returned. She was in her room reading one of Xander's hard-boiled detective novels. Do they have scrambled and sunny-side up detective novels, too? She wondered. 'Cause that would be kind of . . . ew? She heard the over-cautious noises of people trying to be quiet, punctuated by bursts of giggles. Whatever was going on in the living room sounded like a lot more fun than sleep. She could use a cup of tea right about now, anyway. She was just thirsty—not nosy. Nope. Not at all. Thirsty and curious. Curious was a much better word than nosy.“You guys didn't wake me up, I wasn't asleep yet,” Dawn said as she joined them in the living room. “Did you have a nice walk?”
“Yeah, until Xander got attacked by the Pink Ranger,” Willow said, as she burst into giggles again.
“By the what?”
Xander wiped his eye, which was watering with merriment, on his shirt sleeve. “You remember Harmony Kendall, Dawn?”
“Kinda hard to forget someone who kidnaps you, chains you up and threatens to kill you,” Dawn said dryly.
“Oh, yeah. I forgot about that.”
“Actually, that sounds like more than a few of your dates, Xander,” Willow giggled.
“Hey! You been hitting the caffeine again, Will?”
“It's just jet lag! Jet lag and joy at seeing you guys again. Jet lag and joy and . . . Super!Harmony!” Willow collapsed on the couch, holding her sides.
It was sort of cool seeing Willow and Xander acting like goofy adolescents, Dawn decided. Xander had seemed so serious at first. She liked to think she had helped him get back a little of the playfulness at which he used to excel, but he and Willow had just taken things to a whole new level.
“How about if I make us all some tea and you can tell me all about it, 'cause you're both so hyper you'll never get to sleep like this!” Dawn suggested.
The giggles and merriment continued while she made the tea. As she returned from the kitchen, carefully balancing three cups of chamomile tea, Xander took one and she handed a second to Willow.
“Well, since it looked like you weren't gonna share the kickapoo joy juice or whatever you were smoking so we could all be silly and giddy, I thought the next best option was chamomile tea, so we could all be calm and serene.” Dawn smiled to let them know she was joking.
“It's jet lag! I keep telling you that, but no one believes me!” Willow's lips formed a faux pout, and then grinned. “Dawnie! You will never believe what happened to us! Oh, you tell her, Xander—I'll just interject at appropriate moments.” Willow leaned back and sipped her tea.
Xander put down his tea cup and began to pace back and forth for a few seconds, as he gathered his thoughts.
“Okay. Here goes. Feel free to interrupt if I forget something, Will. When Harmony left Sunnydale after she and Spike broke up for the second time, she went to LA. She tried to team up with Cordy, and Angel's crew, but Angel was scary and distrustful and she got seduced by a vampire—a former tele-marketer with a pyramid scheme.”
Xander's lips twitched and Willow covered her mouth with her hand.
Dawn gave them a quelling look, and in her best professorial tone, stated, “Go on.”
“Harmony got caught up in the pyramid thingy and ended up kinda betraying Cordy and Angel, but she felt really bad about it. I ask you—what is wrong with this picture?”
Dawn and Willow looked confused.
“Uh,” Dawn suggested, “it's wrong to betray your friends?” She didn't have a clue about the point Xander was trying to make.
“No, no, no! Well, yes, it is wrong to betray your friends. But why should an unsouled vampire care about that? Y'know, I really miss the old days—back when a vampire was just an evil, soulless demon and you weren't expected to relate to them; you just killed them. But, no! First we couldn't kill Angel, 'cause Angel had a soul. Then, we couldn't kill Spike, because Spike had a chip and then a soul. And now there's Harmony—she doesn't have a chip or a soul—she has a 'calling'!”
Xander picked up his now cool tea and drank it in one gulp.
“Apparently, Harmony decided she wanted to 'make something of herself'.” Xander sighed. “She always was a terrible vampire. Not 'terrible' as in 'Ivan the Terrible' or anything like that, but you gotta admit, as a scary vampire, Harmony really sucked.”
Willow and Dawn caught each other's eyes and wo-manfully refrained from giggling.
“So, while other vampires are out spending their evenings terrorizing and killing the citizens, Harmony is going to night school—to be a secretary!”
“Administrative assistant,” Willow interjected.
“Oh, yeah. She was pretty rabid on that point, wasn't she? Anyway, she graduated from night school—with honors, no less. The mind boggles. She had a few jobs here and there and then she landed at the typing pool at Wolfram and Hart and—get this—Wesley chose her to be Angel's Administrative Assistant! Do you believe that? So, she worked for Angel for a year, and she says she's been totally off human blood for almost three years, except for that one time when a mean girl spiked her thermos—don't ask. We didn't. She really wanted to be part of the team, but Angel treated her like crap and she was seduced by a 'quote' really hot guy who wore hand-made Italian suits and was totally supportive and attentive and a really, really good kisser—almost as good as Spikey. 'End quote'.”
Dawn and Willow burst out laughing at Xander's wickedly good imitation of Harmony's voice patterns.
“Ohmigod! I so should have gone with you guys! I can't believe I missed all this!” Dawn exclaimed. “And this guy is a really, really good kisser, but not as good as Spike, huh?”
“Hey! She said that—I didn't!”
“Oh, I know, Xan. But doesn't it make you just a little bit curious about Spike's talents? I mean, have you seen that tongue?”
Five eyes glazed for a moment of imagining. Xander recovered first.
“Totally off topic, Dawn! Anyway, I'm not too clear on the next part. Uh, Harmony was trying to be good, but she doesn't have a soul so she was trying to take her clues from Angel, but he didn't have any confidence in her and he was a terrible mentor and he set her up to betray him. So she did. It turned out, it was all part of Angel's plan, but she really wished he'd taken her into his confidence and actually let her help, instead of just assuming she'd tell Mr. Good Kisser Angel's plans. Which she did, but it was totally not her fault and Angel knew that because he gave her a good letter of recommendation. Was that the gist of it, Will?”
Willow nodded emphatically. “Oh, yeah. I understood you perfectly. You might not have any knowledge of Latin or Sumerian, but you're great at translating Harmony-speak!”
Xander bowed. “Thank you. Thank you verra much.”
“Wow! I'm impressed. You can do Harmony and Elvis.” Dawn raised an eyebrow. “What other hidden talents do you have?”
Xander leered and wiggled his eyebrows. “That's for me to know, and you to find out!” And then he blushed furiously. Was he flirting with Dawn? Xander wondered. Buffy's little sister? Who wasn't very little any more, come to think of it. She was only a few inches shorter than he and was built like a fashion model, with long legs that went on forever— Not going there! Not going there at all! Dawn is my friend and my roommate and—
“Did you say something, Willow? I think I zoned out for a second.”
“I want to tell her the best part! Okay, Xander?”
“Sure—make me do the whole set-up and you jump in and steal the punchline!” Xander grinned. “Go ahead, Will. I'll make more tea.”
He was glad to get out of the room for a few minutes, anyway. Come to think of it, that chamomile tea had been awful. Xander decided to make hot cocoa instead. As he carefully heated the milk and stirred in sugar and cocoa powder, he also tried to clear his mind of any stray lascivious thoughts about Dawn—who was not only gorgeous, but funny and smart and understanding and . . . almost nineteen.
Okay, not doing so good with the clearing; let's try repressing instead! He stuffed all the confusing feelings and bad!dirty!wrong thoughts way down deep inside. The cocoa started to bubble, so Xander grabbed a dish towel and lifted the pan from the heat. He poured three cups of cocoa and then ran the dish towel under cold water and wiped his face. He fervently hoped he managed a natural-looking smile as he put the cups on a cookie sheet and carried them in.
“Wha'd I miss?” he asked brightly.
“Not a thing, Willow assured him. “We decided to wait till you got back before going on with the story. Thanks,” she added as she accepted a cup of cocoa and held it between her hands. “This smells great.”
“Fabulous coffee and cocoa?” Dawn said. “Again, with the impressed. I now designate you the official beverage maker of the house. I don't think I let that tea steep long enough or something.”
“It was fine, Dawn,” Xander objected. Off her look of incredulity, he admitted, “Okay, it was awful. I hereby accept the title of Official Beverage Maker. But, uh, only for actual meetings and things, right? I mean, if either of you wake up in the middle of the night with a sudden craving for a tropical fruit smoothie, you're on your own.”
“It's getting really late, and I still have that jet lag thing going on, so I think we'd better wind this up for tonight, okay?” At their nods, Willow continued. “Harmony took her letter of recommendation and got out of Wolfram and Hart fast. Then things started to get crazy. There were demons popping up all over LA, and she swears she saw a dragon circling overhead. She was scared, so she hurried home and locked herself in her apartment. A few hours later, there was sort of a huge pop sound, like when you open a can of warm soda fast, she said, and then all the demons on the streets disappeared. Harmony said she felt a pulling sensation, and she thinks if she'd been outside, she would have gotten pulled into whatever happened, too. But she was safe in her apartment, so she watched Oprah and then she went to bed.
“A week or so later, she went by Wolfram and Hart out of curiosity, and found the building completely destroyed. When she went to buy her animal blood from a specialty shop she uses, the proprietor had all the latest news from the demon world, and she discovered that Angel and his crew had completely taken out the Circle of the Black Thorn, whatever that is—Harmony didn't know either, but from the gossip, they were the real muckety-mucks in the demon world. Not only was there a power vacuum at the top, but half of the demons in town had disappeared along with the Demon Horde that she guessed the Black Thorn sent against Angel. Word on the street is that the A.I team was killed during the battle, and Harmony felt she was partly to blame for that because she had told Mr. Good Kisser about Angel's plans.
“So . . . she decided that if it was sort of her fault that Angel and Spike were gone and there was no one to fight evil and help the helpless, it was her responsibility to take over, in her own inimitable way, of course. So she got herself a hot pink catsuit and a gold cape with a big H on the back, and now she's Super!Harmony, defender of the weak, vampire slayer and rogue demon hunter.”
Willow and Xander were both giggling again.
“It actually says that on her card,” Xander concluded. “Super!Harmony, Defender of the Weak, Bad Vampire Slayer and Rogue Demon Hunter. But she doesn't have an organization, like Angel, she explained; she's working alone, so she wasn't about to put her address or phone on the business cards. I don't know how she expects people to contact her, unless the mayor decides to put up a Harm-signal that shines a big pink H in the sky.”
“Or maybe people in need can just play ABBA music really, really loud,” Willow suggested.
“At this point, she's pretty much just patrolling various sections of the city. Oh! And she took a course of Tae Kwon Do at the Y!”
“But, she did say she'll keep her ears open for any more information on the battle and the Black Thorn and Angel and the guys, and we're meeting her tomorrow? The day after tomorrow? Is it tomorrow now? We're meeting her the next evening after we finish this day and night and and another day, for coffee, so you'll be able to see for yourself, and now I'm so tired I'm not thinking straight, so get out of here so I can go to bed, already!”
Willow curled up on the couch and Xander brought his comforter to put over her while Dawn carried the cups into the kitchen. Willow was out like a light before Xander and Dawn could get to their own rooms.
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Continue to Chapter Five
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