Richard cast a spell over the trays of eggs, smiling when a single slightly smaller egg glowed blue, showing it was of a different species than the others. "Probably a cuckoo bird of some type," he decided as he removed it.

Holding the egg in one hand he slowly wove a net of magic around it. Finding it was both fertilized and viable, he smiled. "If this turns out to be the only one of its kind on Earth, it'll pay off my debt to Lurconis in full," he told the assistant mayor.

"A bird egg?" Alan asked curiously as he accepted the egg and carefully placed it in a felt lined box.

"Lurconis is a snake demon who prefers babies as his food source," the mayor said cheerfully. "Nasty business that, but to each his own. Where was I? Oh yes. Being a snake demon who favors devouring the young an egg resonates both with his form and his sin. The destruction of an entire species by devouring that one egg, if it does indeed turn out to be from an extinct species, will pay off my debt to him in full, so no further sacrifices to him will be needed."

"Being responsible for the extinction of an entire species sounds impressive... but a single egg isn't exactly something you can resurrect an entire species from," Alan pointed out.

The mayor nodded. "It would take enormous amounts of time and resources to resurrect a species from a single example and would fail, more likely than not, but magic doesn't care about distinctions like that, all that matters is that by devouring that single bird egg Lurconis has caused its complete extinction."

"The rarer and more valuable the sacrifice, the more powerful it is," Alan quoted.

The Mayor grinned widely. "I'm glad you've been paying attention. Now, Alexander has requested a hammer for his girlfriend."

"A hammer, sir?" Alan asked curiously.

"Yes indeed," Richard said with a wide smile. "While most Slayers get right to the heart of the matter with a wooden stake, Miss Summers appears to be more... blunt. I can't say I'm not surprised, the use of a hammer on vampires seems wildly inefficient, though combined with her strength it would allow her to take down opponents who are all but immune to a Slayer's preferred weapons."

"Medieval warhammers often had a spike on one end," Alan pointed out as studying medieval weaponry was one of his hobbies.

"Properly blessed... Yes, it would be an effective weapon," the Mayor said thoughtfully, "even against vampires. Alan, see what you can dig up in the way of enchanted warhammers. When you find a suitable one, pass it along to Miss Summers with my compliments."

"I'll get right on that sir," Alan said, smiling slightly at the fact that one of his hobbies would actually be useful for work.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"Here," Giles said, passing Faith a glass of lemonade and a couple of aspirin.

"I hate hangovers," Faith groaned before taking the aspirin and downing the entire glass.

"It helps to drink a glass of water before passing out," Giles suggested. "Of course when you're that drunk common sense goes out the window and you rarely take anyone's advice."

"I can't believe you had me doing math while drunk off my ass," Faith groaned out.

"Magic is a complex and dangerous act," Giles said. "Once you've managed to handle advanced mathematics while completely pissed you won't have to worry about making a mistake while casting."

"I can't tell if you're brilliant or crazy," the dark haired teen complained.

"The line between the two can be quite blurry," Giles offered.

"Surprised you weren't drinking along with me," Faith said as she stretched.

"Someone has to be sober," Giles told her. "While this method is great for learning magic, it does nothing for your common sense. I'm a powerful spellcaster when drunk, who casts almost effortlessly, however I am also a complete idiot who would think nothing of setting my surroundings on fire and hunting demons for fun."

Faith snickered. "Good judgment is learned by making poor decisions," she quoted.

"Precisely," Giles agreed, "and I have such good judgment now that it's amazing I survived my late teens."

"So... what lessons are we going to learn while I'm sober?" she asked.

"How are you at picking locks?" Giles asked.

"I can undo handcuffs with a hairpin in a handful of seconds, most common door locks with the right tools, and I have a vague understanding of safe cracking," she replied.

"That's quite comprehensive," he complimented her. "Pick pocket?"

"Skilled," she replied smugly.

"Including planting evidence on someone?" he asked hopefully.

"Yes," she agreed.

Giles nodded. "Excellent. Once you have mastered lighting and extinguishing a candle and moved on to telekinesis... I have a couple of tricks that will let you cut the time it takes to pick locks by quite a bit."

"When you say quite a bit..."

"A flex of will, so perhaps half a second," he said smugly.

"And I can learn that?" Faith asked excitedly.

"If you've got the patience," Giles told her. "Most magic users go for big and flashy, but even when I was a drunken tosspot I knew there was a time for subtlety, so I trained my telekinesis not just to fling people around, fun as that is, but to also feel out my surroundings. Even with the majority of my magic sealed I can pop open handcuffs with just a thought."

"Telekinesis? What's that got to do with magic?" she asked curiously.

"Every single psychic ability is magical in nature," Giles replied. "Psychic abilities are simply untrained magical talents."

"Seriously?" she asked. "Makes some of Stephen King's work hit a bit differently."

"Oh yes," Giles said. "Carrie and Firestarter are both based on true stories. Young girls with enormous power and little control, pushed beyond their limits by fools and morons. Patience and Susan, to use their real names, were both rescued by the Council and delivered to one of the more powerful covens we work with. Both recovered from their ordeals though Patience is still uncomfortable around large groups of people and Susan is quite... flirty."

"Did you bang Charlie?!" Faith demanded with a grin.

Giles winced. "I wouldn't put it like that and to be honest she's all but a force of nature, so..."

"So she banged you?" Faith asked with a smirk.

"I am so glad one of my most practiced skills was controlling fire," Giles said. "A little burn cream and I was fine. My eyebrows grew back rather quickly and were less bushy, which I was quite pleased with."

Faith laughed so hard she fell off the couch and cradled her aching head. "Oh god, no more!"

"I said something quite similar," Giles told the laughing teen.

"You're killing me," Faith wheezed out between bouts of laughter.

"That too," Giles offered with a grin.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Alan Finch, the assistant Mayor of Sunnydale, happily sorted through the reports he requested on magical warhammers they could quickly purchase. He was in a good mood, something that was happening more frequently thanks to a certain teen, as the man he worked for was accomplishing his goals with ever decreasing amounts of... things he didn't like to think about, necessary for the town's safety or not.

His eyes lit up as he admired a picture of a massive long handled warhammer. It was obviously too large for the Slayer to wield, but it was an impressive piece.

Realizing it'd take far too long to go through the stack of folders if he wasted time drooling over every one, he quickly sorted out the ones too big for a teenage girl to wield, which turned out to be all but five of them.

The one with a berserker curse, or blessing of Odin they reported, was set aside as well, the last thing they needed was a berserk Slayer.

Another was added to the discard pile when its history showed it had been used to execute criminals for some eighty years in one of the small eastern Europe countries. While it wasn't cursed or possessed, that sort of thing left a mark that would probably repulse a Slayer. It was rather a shame as one side was a very sharp axe blade that a slayer would probably adore.

The next one Alan lingered over. It had a spike on one end, a massive flat head on the other, and was covered in Nordic runes praising Thor. Apparently it was a recent creation by a Marvel fanboy who'd gone through the trouble of having it enchanted with a glamour spell that acted like a SEP field so he could carry it around without anyone questioning it and some minor electrical enchantments because they 'looked cool'.

Alan glanced at the remaining two folders each containing ancient weapons that had seen battle and drawn blood, protecting hearth and home from invaders. They were both worthy weapons for a Slayer to wield, ones that had a history and were forged for battle!

"She'll definitely want the one with the minor spells on it, it looks amazing," he decided, making the choice and calling a service to pick it up, have it thrice blessed and delivered to the Slayer with the Mayor's compliments.

That done, Alan checked the clock and saw it was nearly lunch time, which meant he could spend the rest of the afternoon drooling over ancient warhammers!

Alan opened up the folder to look over the hammer blessed/cursed in the name of Odin. "Man, what I wouldn't give to be able to have that hanging over my mantel, but I doubt it's in my... price range?"

He blinked as he saw how little it actually cost.

"The mayor really does get the best prices on everything he buys."

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"I'm surprised you aren't rushing off to spend time with your new boyfriend," Joyce told her daughter as she joined her in the kitchen for lunch.

"Still need to get my room just right," Buffy told her mom. "Half the keepsakes I have from LA I'm not keeping and my weapons are in need of some polish. I use clear fingernail polish on my stakes so I don't get splinters. Plus, I kinda want to give Xander and Willow a little couple's time."

"That's very understanding of you," Joyce said, "Normally you'd be..."

"A complete... B word," Buffy said honestly, "but I don't want to be that person anymore, so I won't."

"You are growing up so fast," Joyce said, "if only your father was still alive to see it."

Buffy rolled her eyes, having heard this joke before. "Dad's not dead," she reminded her.

"He is to me," Joyce said with a grin. "So, tell me about your second trip."

"Willow brushed against the shed while leaving and got dragged along. As you can tell from the giant snowball, we landed somewhere very cold. So there we are, the only two people on Earth... and there's suddenly a pounding at the door."

Joyce laughed. "I'd have wet myself."

"I nearly did," Buffy admitted. "Willow comes in covered in snow and freezing after just a few seconds outside and Xander zips the two sleeping bags together and tells her to strip and climb inside, because the snow on her clothes is melting and we'd be joining her shortly just as soon as we pegged the shed down to make sure it didn't get blown out to sea."

"Good call, I saw all the penguins," Joyce said.

"Now, Willow had already told me she'd wanted to go camping with Xander since she was nine and Xander didn't start jumping until he was twelve," Buffy explained, getting a knowing nod from Joyce, "so I knew how she felt, in fact I'm pretty sure the entire town with the exception of Xander knew how she felt, but despite that she had explained what was going on with Xander and what to expect, making sure I didn't run into any nasty surprises."

"Sounds like a very good friend," Joyce said. "Much better than the ones you had in LA."

Buffy nodded. "So we all ended up stripped down and cuddled up together and I realized there was no way in hell I was going to put her through three days of being so close to what she most wanted in the world while I had it all to myself. She'd already pretty much checked all the boxes on Best Friend Forever going above and beyond so... I explained things to Xander and after a little resistance, because she's been his best friend since kindergarten, he agreed we would see if we could make things work."

"It's like a letter to Penthouse for the Twilight Zone," Joyce said, more than a little amused.

Buffy snickered. "Yes, that about covers it."

"You know... I'm really surprised I'm so accepting of all of this," Joyce said.

"Me being in a relationship with Xander and sharing him with Willow?" Buffy asked.

"No, vampires and alternate universes," Joyce said. "I seriously doubt there's just the one. An infinity of possible universes..."

Buffy shrugged. "After the whole vampires and demons thing I'm really not that surprised. I mean, mankind kicked all the true demons off the earth back in prehistory, so they had to go somewhere."

"It's still rather mind blowing," Joyce said honestly.

"Remind me to tell you about the Siamese twins in Vegas where only one of them was a vampire," Buffy said as they got up to put their dishes in the sink.

"I have time now," Joyce pointed out.

"It's not a story to tell on a full stomach," Buffy said, "totally grody."

"I'll take your word for it," Joyce decided.

*Ring*Ring*

"I'll get it," Buffy said. She hurried to the front door and opened it, only to discover a bluish-purple spiky demon dressed in a trench coat and fedora like he was a noir detective, holding a small crate.

"Delivery," he said.

"Demon!" Buffy exclaimed.

"Brachen," he assured her, "we're pacifists."

"There are pacifist demons?" the Slayer asked in disbelief.

He frowned. "That's a bit racist, don't you think?"

"I-" Buffy was momentarily speechless.

"Who is it, dear?" Joyce asked as she came out of the kitchen.

"I have a delivery for one Buffy Summers," the demon offered.

"That's me," Buffy said slowly. "Sorry, I'm really not used to demons giving me things."

"I'm just the delivery service," the demon said with a sigh. "Please sign for the package so I can go."

"Sure," Buffy said, quickly signing the form and accepting the small crate, "and sorry for..."

"It's okay, I get that all the time," the demon said, making her feel even worse as he turned and vanished.

"What just happened?" Joyce asked.

"I just discovered you can be racist against demons, apparently," Buffy said, pushing the door closed with her butt, "and I just got a box in the mail."

"Do you need me to get the pry bar?" Joyce asked.

"No, I've got it," Buffy said, setting it on the coffee table and prying off the top by hand.

"Still can't get over how strong you are," Joyce said as her daughter reached into the packing peanuts and drew out a massive silver warhammer.

"Christmas came early," Buffy said excitedly, cradling it like a baby.

"Those runes look familiar," Joyce said.

"I am Buffy, grand-something-daughter of Thor, god of Thunder," she announced, holding the hammer over her head, electricity crackling over its surface. "Holy crap, I actually am!"

Typing By: Abyssal Angel

Beta By: Abyssal Angel and Mist of Shadows