Title: Protector
Author: Serendipity
Email: trekchic@usa.net
Distribution: Y'all know me. I say yes. Just ask beforehand so I know.
Disclaimer: the characters belong to Joss Whedon
Rating: PG-13 (language, violence and content)
Author's Notes: Oz doesn't exist...again (I'm SORRY!!!) and uhm..Oh, this is my take on what fourth season would be like for 'Buffy' and for the new series 'Angel'. (meaning, all of the previous seasons are fair game. I haven't seen Grad2 yet, though, so don't worry about that type of spoilage. Angel is in L.A.) Only difference: (big one) the Scooby Gang is still in high school. So, the events of season 3 took place their junior year. Oh, and lastly, for those who have read it and are wondering, this is totally unrelated to one of my other stories, When Stars Collide. :) Feedback is, as always, adored, highly appreciated, very motivational and always responded to.
Dedication: to everyone who's ever wanted to have something dedicated to them but never has, this story is wholeheartedly for you.

Part 10


Calmly, Whistler unlocked the door only to be confronted with a very angry Angel. Without thinking, the vampire charged into the house, only to be repelled several feet backwards by the invisible shield surrounding it.

“Hey, nice move there, Dr. Badass.” Whistler stared down at his protégé and quirked an eyebrow.

Snarling, Angel got to his feet, “Where is she? I need to talk to her.”

“You can try,” the demon beckoned grandly, “Why don’t ya come on in and make yourself comfortable?”

Storming into the house, Angel didn’t spare Whistler a second glance. “Bastard.” He muttered under his breath.

The demon merely smiled. “You’re welcome.”

Willow hurried down the stairs, almost tripping over the cluster of girls crowded around the bottom who were whispering in barely restrained excitement.

“He’s here. Whistler just let him in.” JR updated the hacker.

“Good luck!” Heather smiled warmly.

“Go get him,” Jessica purred in her most seductive voice eliciting giggles from all of her companions.

Rolling her eyes behind her veil, Willow leaned over, “Thanks guys, but I don’t want you to have to stay up so late for me. Council will get worried and you know that tweed and sweat don’t mix.”

Laura snorted.

“Why don’t you all go get Cordy and go back home.” The redhead gently ushered them back upstairs.

“Aww but…”

“Do we HAVE to?!”

“Nigel and Terrance sleep on the floor next to me and they *snore *!”

“I thought we were going to sleep over HERE…”

Shaking her head, Willow stopped all argument, ‘I’d love to have you guys, but not tonight. Tell you what, ice cream on me, tomorrow, okay?”

Enduring a few hushed shouts of jubilation, Willow firmly pointed to the stairs until the entire group had filed reluctantly up them.

Bracing herself, she re-entered the living room.

At her entrance, Angel abruptly jumped up from his strained position, seated uncomfortably on the couch, “I-I’m sorry to come over here so late….” He began haltingly. Seeing her standing there, even if it was only her cloaked figure in a nondescript outfit, it was still emotionally unnerving. Suddenly, he began to have doubts over his purpose for visiting.

Gently, Willow inclined her head sideways, hoping that it conveyed her acceptance.

“I-I’d just like to speak to you.”

Whistler entered the room carrying a soda.

“Alone.”

Spinning on his heel in mid-stride, Whistler smoothly turned and left the room again.

As soon as the demon was gone, Angel dropped to one knee and took her hand.

An almost involuntary thrill went through the hacker’s small frame over the significance of such a pose. She quickly destroyed it on the grounds that it was an utterly immature reaction.

“I know who you are and what you stand for and I’m sorry that you were somehow drawn into this.” He said softly, from his prone position.

Sickeningly, the redhead felt her heart stop beating. < He knows who I am? As in, ‘Hey Willow, nice threads. What’s a mousy loser like you doing protecting a guy like me?’ That kind of KNOWS? >

‘I wish you’d told me in your email that you were the Immortal Watcher, but I understand that Whistler didn’t want that. I promise to make this as painless and quick as possible for both of us, though.”

Nodding numbly, Willow’s panic bells were going off wildly in her head even though she didn’t know why. Instinctually, she leaned closer, hanging on his every word.

Abruptly, he seized her hand harder and pulled it over his unbeating heart. Then, he started speaking in Gaelic.

The words were flying by so rapidly that she could only guess what they meant. That is, until one word flashed through her mind and caught.

< ‘Release…’ >

She recognized it from the soul restoration spell she’d had to perform. < What would he want to release? > It didn’t take long for the redhead’s blinding intelligence to supply an answer < Me! He’s trying to release me from my duties as Protector!! >

Stricken and horrified, Willow quickly jerked her hand out of Angel’s grasp before he could finish and did the next thing that came to mind.

She backhanded him across the room.

Limping slightly, Cordelia walked back in silence towards her apartment, surrounded by a circle of slayers. She didn’t bother to make an effort to even look around knowing that it was unlikely any vampire would be able to successfully attack the group and that if the girls were doing anything illegal, she wouldn’t be able to stop them anyway.

< How DARE they blackmail me? Manhandle me? Disobey me? > She fumed in dead silence, refusing to acknowledge the real source of her anger. For all of the insults, death threats and general hysteria Cordelia had experienced with the small slayers, the worst part was feeling ‘second best’ when they got to see Willow. Although she intellectually understood the hacker’s stronger bond to the group, it still hurt to be relegated to the back of the line.

< No, I’m not hurt because they’re all little cretins and I’ll be glad to see them leave anyways…right? >

Sighing loudly, Cordelia realized, with relief, that they were less than a block away from her apartment.

“Cordelia?”

She wrinkled her nose. < NO, we couldn’t have just gotten there without anything happening could we have? > “Yeah, what?”

“Uhm….” Emma stared up at her with clear blue eyes, “Thanks.” And with that, the tiny girl with blond curly hair latched onto the former cheerleader with a vice-like grip.

“Yeah, thanks. We’re sorry for, like, pretending to blackmail you and stuff.” Hilary quickly latched onto her other hand.

“We never would’ve really ratted you out to the council either.” Tracy added sincerely.

“WE LOVE YOU CORDELIA!!!” Laura hollered as loudly as possible in an incredibly obnoxious voice before throwing her arms around the brunette’s legs.

Before she could stop them, Cordelia was literally covered with tiny bodies, preventing her from moving so much as another step. Rolling her eyes, she tried desperately to contain the smile that was twitching at the corner of her lips, “Yeah, whatever.”

“You’re really, like, the coolest. I mean, you coulda said no and stuff.” Teri said, ‘But you didn’t.”

“EVERYONE says ‘no’ to us,” Heather sighed.

“We never get to do anything or go anywhere.” Robin nodded in agreement.

“The Council tends to keep us ‘sheltered’ pretty much all the time. Most of us don’t have any friends or anyone else to talk to back at home and, I mean, I know that I haven’t seen my parents for the past 6 or 7 years.” JR added.

“Me neither,” Eliz shrugged, “I don’t really miss them, because I don’t remember them too well, but getting to hang out with the rest of you guys for the past couple of days has just been the greatest.”

“It was really nice of you to bring us to meet the Immortal Watcher, we appreciate it,” Carrie smiled warmly, “Oh, and I know that Laura is really sorry for shoving you in the hall like she did.”

“Huh?….Oh, yeah.” The look on the raven-haired girl’s face made it clear that the statement was somewhat of an afterthought.

“So, do you forgive us?” Jessica asked hopefully.

“Sure.” The brunette tried to sound disaffected but couldn’t help but feel bad for the group around her. She’d have to remember to bring it up with Willow at some point. Vaguely, she remembered how Kendra had been trained and how entirely different her experience had been compared to Buffy’s. Cordelia tended to forget things like that, especially because most of the details occurred during a more self-centered stage of her life.

“Cool. Now that we’re all kosher, can I try on your silver knee-high boots when we get home?” Jessica asked again with an equal amount of hopefulness.

“Don’t push it.”

“Uhm, just kidding.”

Shaking her hand slightly to bring feeling back into it, she quickly stepped over Angel’s stunned form with only a small pang of guilt and stalked silently into the kitchen.

“Whistler!” She barked harshly, her voice barely above a whisper.

The demon started from her sudden entrance, almost choking on his soda, “Huh? What happened?”

“I’m going to get my laptop. Hook Angel up to AOL on the computer in the living room under your screen name.”

“Yes, ma’am!” He gave her a cocky grin and a sloppy salute before sauntering out the door. “Hah! What the hell happened to you?!” he asked just before the door swung shut behind him.

Willow heard him laughing at the vampire in the other room and sighed, allowing the guilt to wash over her. < I did it AGAIN! What the heck is wrong with me?! Power…power going to the head…bad bad bad things happen…. > Pushing her thoughts temporarily aside, she hurried upstairs.

“Okay, so this grey thing is called the mouse. It makes the pointy thing on the screen go ‘woosh’.” Whistler took another swig of soda before staring down condesendingly at the vampire sitting at the computer, still nursing a sore jaw.

“It wasn’t funny when Cordelia did it and it still isn’t funny now.” Angel muttered, waiting for the line to connect.

“She really clocked you one, huh? She’s a feisty chick. I coulda warned you.”

“But you didn’t.”

“What’d you do to set her off?”

“I tried to release her from her duties.”

“Then you SO deserved it.” Whistler shook his head.

Smiling faintly, the vampire shrugged, “She’s young. I didn’t think she knew Gaelic that fluently.”

Pausing thoughtfully, the demon furrowed his brows, “Gaelic? Neither did I…”

The sudden chiming of the computer put an end to the conversation as Angel quickly turned his attention to the monitor:


Instant message from: Protector1 “I’m sorry about hitting you, are you okay?”


Staring at the computer with a blank look on his face Angel slowly turned to Whistler for help.

“Click reply and then type in the box. She’s in the other room IMing you from her laptop.” The demon explained.


Instant message from: Protector1 I really hope you aren’t mad or anything. I mean, I don’t normally get violent. I’m really an unviolent person. I’m SO sorry I hit you. I don’t know what came over me..


Glancing up at the additional message, Angel carefully formulated his response and began gingerly hunting for the right keys.


Instant message from: Protector1 I mean, I normally don’t overreact. Like, I try to stay really cool-headed. Are you really mad? Is that why you’re not responding? Gosh I’m so sorry. If you want to dismiss me as your Protector, you can, but I want you to know that I really thought it was an honor to be chosen and I’ve let the Council know and they’re…uhm…fully supporting me on this…


Slightly panicking as her messages became more numerous, Angel tried to reformulate his response while searching for the delete key.

Whistler merely rolled his eyes.


Instant message from: Protector1 I also want to personally apologize for not letting you know sooner that I’m Immortal Watcher. Like, you must be really uncomfortable about this since I know that Watchers and vampires get along about as well as slayers and vampires do…LOL. (sorry, lame joke) :) Uhm….are you still mad?


“What does lawl mean?” Angel stared expectantly up at Whistler.

“LOL….not ‘lawl’ it means ‘Laughing Out Loud’, it’s Internet lingo.” The demon shrugged, “Dude, you should probably try typing something back before you give her a heart attack.”

“I’m trying, I’m trying!! She just goes so fast…” Angel stared at the keys in frustration again.

Both men groaned at the sound of the IM chime yet again.


Instant message from: Protector1 So anyways, I’m sorry. Have I mentioned that before? Oh, and I’m sure that Whistler’s really sorry for not telling you everything too.


“No I’m not.” The demon shook his head at the computer screen.

Ignoring him, Angel rapidly sent out a short message.


Instant message from: LoungeLizrd Wait.


Up in her room, Willow’s fingers immediately froze over her keyboard and her breath caught in her throat.

Back downstairs, blissful silence returned and with it came Angel’s ability to think properly.


Instant message from: LoungeLizrd I’m bad at this. Tpying is new to me and I’m still getting the hang of it. Sorry. Just give me a second.


The red head sighed in relief.


Instant message from: LoungeLizrd Typing. I meant to say typing. And of not of.


She giggled softly before responding.


Instant message from: Protector1 It’s okay, Angel. I completely understand.

“This has just really been the best night of my life.” Tracy sighed happily as Cordelia unlocked the door.

It had been at least 5 minutes since they started but the girls seemed unable to stop gushing.

“I know, it’s like first we get to hang out with each other, and then we meet Cordelia, and then we get to meet ANGEL and then we get to meet the fricking Immortal Watcher, I mean what next…?” Laura’s voice trailed off and her dark eyes widened as Cordelia pushed open the door.

Jessica recognized the slightly frazzled looking blonde girl at the other end of the hall almost instantly.

“Holy fucking shit, its Buffy Summers.” She said softly, her eyes glazed over in disbelief.

Cocking her head to one side, the current Slayer turned and smiled at the assembled group, “Oh, hi! You must be the slayers in training! I was wondering when you would be getting ba-,”

“OHMYGOD!!” Staring over Emma’s shoulder, Hilary started screaming at the sight of her idol, “OHMYGOD, OHMYGOD, OHMYGOD!” Hopping up and down, she quickly shoved her way past her friends and took off.

Cordelia braced herself as the tide of small squirming bodies rushed passed her into apartment, “And you’d figure it was the Backstreet Boys or something.” She shook her head.

Within seconds, the mildly frightened Slayer found herself being charged in the narrow hallway by a large contingent of screaming girls.

“This is fucking better than Disney World!!!” Laura whooped jubilantly.

“Buffy kicks Mickey’s ass any day!” Heather shouted in response.

“I think I liked the ‘They’re rushing me, what do I do now?’ face on Willow better,” Cordelia said thoughtfully as she watched Buffy go down at the end of the hall.

“We still love you too, Cordelia.” Carrie reminded her, having held back with the brunette.

“You can go over there, Carrie.” The brunette sighed over-dramatically, “I don’t mind.”

Within seconds, the redhead had gratefully scampered off as well, leaving the former cheerleader alone at the end of the hallway.

Still smiling.




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