InsaneJournal

“He’s who again?” demanded Xander, glaring at the man he was currently holding up against the wall with one arm.

“The principal,” repeated Dawn. She tugged on his other arm and said, “C’mon, Xander, let him down. He can’t explain if you keep him up there.”

“Sure, he can!” yelped Spike from the corner of the room as Tara worked on pulling the splinters from a stake out of his shoulder. “Bloody wanker attacked me!”

“You’re a vampire,” growled Wood, glaring at him. He then looked down at Xander, who was smiling coldly up at him with red eyes, and hissed, “You keep that thing here?”

Xander nodded slowly in response and replied, “Two reasons: he’s actually rather useful and I don’t kill things that have a soul if I can help it. Oh, and for your information, dear Principal Wood, I’m a vampire too but I’m a lot nastier than he is. Now, you want to explain just how you are aware of what’s going on?”

“Not in particular.”

“Okay then.”

Unceremoniously, he dropped the man to the floor and turned his back on him to the surprise of Dawn and the Slayerette’s watching from the living room. When Wood leapt at him, Xander vanished for a moment then reappeared again after the principal had been slammed back against the wall by an invisible force, his hand around the man’s throat.

“Don’t do that again,” he cautioned. “Now do you want to talk?”

Dawn bit her lip then said, “We’re not the bad guys, really.”

“’Course we’re not the bad guys,” intoned Faith flippantly as she entered the room. “I mean, I’m here. And, Fangs, you can let him down, Giles just figured out who he is and why he attacked Blond Boy.”

“ ‘Blond Boy’?!” repeated Spike indignantly then yelped as Tara tugged out a large piece of wood from his skin. “Bloody hell!”

“Okay,” said Xander. He then frowned at Wood and growled, “As much as I dislike Spike, we need his help more than we need his dust on the floor. So you stop trying to kill him and I won’t throw you against anymore walls.”

The principal frowned then nodded and sighed gratefully as he was released. Then he looked at Faith and said, “You. You’re the Slayer.”

“In the flesh,” replied the brunette with a smile. She then frowned and said, “And as nice as avenging your mother might be, it’s not really something you should be trying to do with an Apocalypse coming.”

“Apocalypse?” repeated Wood.

“Mother?” echoed Xander, looking curiously at Spike.

“Nikki Wood,” said Giles as he entered the room with a book under his arm. “I managed to find one of the diaries her Watcher kept.” He glared towards Spike and continued, “It seems she was killed by William the Bloody and her Watcher raised her son.”

“You blame me?” asked Spike. He then glared right at Xander, asking, “Slayer’s in that other world blame you for killing ‘em? Or they die doing their damn duty?”

“Slayer’s in Darien’s world are a lot different than ours,” growled Xander. “And that’s irrelevant.” He spun towards Wood and spat, “I don’t care what vendetta you’ve got, it had better be forgotten. We’ve got enough problems right now as is.”

Wood scowled and asked, “And if I don’t?”

Faith smirked and replied, “He’ll make sure you stay out of it.”

“Broken legs don’t tend to work,” hissed Xander with a pointed look. He then smiled tightly and said, “I’m usually a really nice guy but you’ve come at a really bad time. So as I see it you have two choices: you can work with us to stop what’s happening here in Sunnyhell and forget the vendetta momentarily or you can keep at it and I break your legs. Personally I’d rather you take the first choice since we could use the help but, hey, I’m not picky.”

“Xander,” scolded Giles but there wasn’t much in it. He knew just how much the suicide of one of the girls and then the arrival of another raving of a crazy preacher allied with the First had taken a toll on his surrogate son in the past few days.

Wood scowled for a long moment, glaring over at Spike in the corner, then spat, “Fine.”

“Good,” said Xander stonily. “And, trust me, if he steps a toe out of line, I’ll be the first one on his ass. Other than that, nobody touches him.” He then turned to look at the Slayerette’s peering into the room and barked, “Move it, girls, training’s on! Since there was the delay, we’ll be working for an extra hour!”

There was a chorus of groans in answer but the girls headed towards the backyard without anymore prompting and Faith followed them with Dawn in her wake. Xander sighed then looked at Spike, who was shrugging back into his coat now and was splinterless. “You good to get kicked around?”

“By several beautiful young woman?” questioned the vampire with a smile. “Bloody right, I am.”

The two were gone then and Giles approached Wood slowly, who asked, “You condone this? That…that thing being here?”

“Sometimes you have to deal with a necessary evil,” answered the Watcher. He took off his glasses to polish them and continued, “And sometimes revenge isn’t the best course of action to take.”

“How can you say that?” demanded Wood. “That monster killed my mother.”

“Who was a Slayer doing her duty. It is a horrible mantle to cast upon a young woman, but cast it is and there is nothing we can do about that.” Giles then frowned as he put his glasses back on, wearily saying, “And I have seen a young man nearly broken by taking revenge for someone he loves. You should consider what you’re doing again and think about what’s more important: revenge for your mother dying whilst doing what she was chosen to or allowing a vampire to live so the world might just be saved.”

The Watcher then turned and left the principal to think on it amongst the almost empty house. Wood sank against the wall for a moment then slowly he moved towards the open back door, watching the commotion in the backyard through the screen.

His eyes followed Faith as she moved slowly through the motions of an attack with the man…vampire…whatever, he was…Xander. Sighing, he leaned against the doorframe and just watched them, debating if he could really put aside revenge.