Work Text:
"Hey, you I know you you were with that Slayer you British sonofabitch!"
Drunken slur makes both heads turn. Blue hair swishes over shoulders. Ironically petite chin rests on a shoulder.
Glasses slide neatly into shirt pocket a little down the bar. For the moment she is content to watch. Perhaps his death will tell her that she was wrong to seek him out.
"Yeah I'm talkin' to you Watcher-man!"
The one called Giles turns on the swiveling seat at the bar. He looks mildly bothered, no more.
"We're not looking for any trouble, why don't you just run along?" asks Giles, not yet smiling. "Or better yet, I'll buy you a drink to be on your way. You look like the sort who likes an umbrella and a bit of fruit with your drink. Does it have a fancy name?"
"Sonofabitch!"
Hurl of orange, slightly slimy fist towards them both.
A flash of blue past Giles's arm. Then crunch. Then yellow blood. Then screams.
Some of it even splashes on Giles' pants. It makes him a little annoyed.
"I've had just about enough," Giles warns, suddenly a little more British than he was before. "I was very clearly sitting here, not bothering a bloody soul and you've got to go starting a fight. And who are you?"
"Do you desire me to release this thing?" Illyria asks giving no attention to the question, cocking her head, still squeezing an orange and yellow hand in hers. She seems oblivious to the blood that's made little rivulets down her arm.
"What?" Giles asks, a little confused by this edge of human civility in a thing which has obviously come by it second hand.
Illyria cocks her head the other way. "It is sometimes your way, I was once told. His death is not necessary to me. Is his life of any benefit?"
Giles smirks, looks over the demon. On the bar, the small, dull knife the barkeeper uses for slicing fruit for drinks lays idly and could serve him well. Giles mutters something, opens his hand in a cool flick.
The knife goes flying, lodges itself into the chest of the demon and twists in a mirror of Giles's hand, turning clockwise at the wrist.
Giles finishes his scotch, stands, pays the bartender.
"No, I suppose not."
They step out into the rain. Laughing, Giles wraps himself around the first streetlight pole and does a funny little dance. Perhaps he celebrates victory, or the joy of free destruction. Illyria walks on heedless of the rain.
"The rain does not burn as before," Illyria notes. "I thought it was a feature of this world, but it appears it is not."
"What the bloody hell are you on about?" Giles asks. "Who are you?"
"Illyria. You knew Wesley."
Giles rolls his eyes. "Not by choice."
"Neither did I," Illyria agrees. "My guide in this world is dead. I find it strange and chaotic. Guide me now."
"And what exactly is my motivation to do that?"
"You desire death and I have been death itself. I will guide you there, if you will guide me here. This rain is strange. I did not see rain until that night, and never again since. I took it always as an omen of strife, but now it seems that it is harmless," Illyria answers.
Giles pulls up his collar to the rain. "The battle with the senior partners. I'd heard about it from -"
Giles stops walking. Illyria stops walking, scans around the area for some clue of impending battle. There are none. She stands and waits, patient enough to endure whatever must occur for him.
"If you're here, what happened to everyone else? Are they alive?"
"Telling the story tires me. There are others who know. "
Giles returns to walking. Illyria follows.
"You wouldn't happen to have known the little green fellow that sings? Willow thought he might be of some use, before -"
"Yes I did. They named him Lorne. He wore bright colors and called Angel pastries. He bleeds from the mouth and reads omens when others do the same."
"Right then. I'm searching all the bars in this area for him. But after that little incident in Cleveland, I seem to be a marked man."
"Incident?"
Giles puts his hands in his pocket. "Listen, Illyria. I'm not sure what you want, but I do know that you did nothing less than murder your way into this world."
"Does this repulse you?"
"Not particularly. But in the absence of you telling me anything, I've got to keep going. So either you're going to help me, or we're going to have a bit of a problem. I don't know if I could take you -"
"You could not."
"That's probably true. I don't really care. I do know I could injure you, and I imagine eventually you'll run across someone who can kill you. Or most mostly likely you'll simply wander about not sure of what to do for as long as things like you live. Judging from what I know of you, that could be a terribly long time. So as I see it, right now you're far more in need of me than I am of you."
Illyria does not bend, though the reasoning strikes her as truer than any she has come across in a long time.
"As long as that is true, I will obey you."
"And then when it's not, you'll kill me," Giles sighs.
"That is the most probable scenario."
Giles walks on in the rain. "For the time being I suppose it's an acceptable proposal. I've got three more bars left. Shall we go murder things for information."
"Violence does not displease me."
"All the better."
As they make their way down the street, the water coming in sheets off of them, Giles asks, "What exactly led you to grace me with your presence. Aren't you evil or something?"
Illyria follows a few paces behind. "I have found in this world that even your warriors speak ill of murder, yet use it as their tool all the same. From what I was told of you, I decided that you could show me which was true. They described you and sounded more like a monarch than any I have yet met. Even Angel was not truly a king."
"Oh really?"
"They say you were called Ripper, and you sought to take whatever you desired without consequence. I wonder though, has this world made you ashamed of that?"
"At moments."
"Only moments?"
"Has this world made *you* ashamed?"
"I have no shame."
"That comes as a total surprise to me," Giles says in the sly, smooth way that Wesley would say untrue things. "Here we are. All set to kill things?"
*****
A body count of eight demons and three vampires between the last two bars. The third holds even smaller promise.
It is much like the previous bar. This bar where there are stares (at Illyria) and sneers (at Giles). It's the last bar of the night, however. So Giles gives into hope. Illyria stays by his side like a weapon that occasionally says inappropriate things in a blunt tone. Much like Anya, only frightening. Anya was a gnat in his ear, buzzing about money and sex.
Illyria's little gems come as thunder claps.
Still, he's refrained from flinching and she's remained mostly quiet. Giles starts to feel hopeful about their arrangement.
Giles sits for a drink. Orders, this time, a Jack Daniels. He inquires about a singing green demon.
Then the bartender takes a closer look, "Hey, wait a minute, aren't you that guy, with that Slayer? You know, the Slayer that did that thing?"
Giles smiles. "I might be."
"Might?"
It is not completely unexpected when a very large demon with spike protruding from his neck stands up, knocking over chairs and table.
"Well, you ain't got a Slayer no more, grandpa," the demon taunts. Takes out a knife. "Heard she went darkside."
Giles sighs. "Hardly. You wouldn't happen to know a singing green demon that goes by the name Lorne? Possibly calls himself the Host?"
The demon laughs. "I'll tell you shit when you pry my cold dead tongue outta my cold dead mouth."
Giles smiles, sits straighter. "Well, that's really quite reasonable. It's nice to know that your kind is even capable of higher cognitive functioning."
"You lost your mind, old man? What I mean is that I'ma kill you and use your skull as an ashtray."
Illyria steps forward. "You'll not get the chance. I will rip your entrails from your body and wrap them around your body as caterpillar cocoons itself and then remove your spine and impale you with it."
The demon seems amused. "A'ight. We can get ta tusslin'. But after you tell me, old timer, what really happened?"
Giles cocks his head. "I suppose I don't mind sharing war stories. Bartender, another round for me and my friend here."
Bartender indifferently pours something into two shot glasses. It's probably not what he's been drinking, but Giles doesn't care. The demon takes the second shot glass, downs it, and hisses in reaction to the alcohol burn.
"Right then," Giles replies, agreeably. "Her name was Buffy. She was probably the most beautiful creature to grace this Earth. Even as Slayers go, she was extraordinary. Because even through all the darkness, she could smile and light up a room. I know it sounds cliche, but it's true. I think she loved me, and I know I loved her."
"Get on with it, grandpa," the demon demands.
"And do you want to know what happened to her?" Giles asks.
Giles tightens the shot glass in his hand, then slams it down on the counter. Lightning fast, hand swings out, shard of glass slashes across the demon's face, taking out his eyes. Then Giles lets the shard rest inside the demon's neck, until it convulses and falls on the floor.
"Well, I suppose the cold dead mouth part was correct," Giles murmurs. "Bartender, do put our drinks on *his* tab."
The bartender nods quickly, obediently. "Dude, who the hell are you?"
"Oh, sorry, terribly rude of me," Giles says. "Do call me Ripper. And if you happen to see a horned green demon singing showtunes, tell him I'm looking for him. Thank you."
Giles and Illyria leave to stares at both of them.
Again, in the rain - walking to the next bar and possibly the next fight.
"Did you murder your Slayer?" Illyria asks.
"Would that make you think less of me."
"No. I am not bound by unnecessary morality. Did you murder her?"
Giles turns his coat collar up again.
"She's dead and I'm not. I'd think the answer would be obvious."
"Tell me, is shame the price of being a true king on this world?"
Giles smiles, watches his knuckles wash clean in the rain. "Only if you're not doing it right."