Congrats On Getting Home. by Voracity2
Summary: The come down from the emergencies gets a bit wacky. Including higher powers wanting sex and other problems.
Categories: Buffy Stories & Crossovers > Avengers Characters: None
Series: Congrats Series
Chapters: 2 Completed: Yes Word count: 27857 Read: 56463 Published: 11/18/2014 Updated: 11/18/2014

1. Part 1 by Voracity2

2. Part 2 by Voracity2

Part 1 by Voracity2
Congrats On Getting Home.






Spike came into view first. He was the least known of all the Council, outside the researchers. Who were also mostly in jail for helping that little war happen. Could you call it a war when it only took a month? He was in Cleveland, going to the demon bars. People gave him scared looks but he shrugged them off. He could handle this and he was pretty hard to kill. After a few days, he went back to the Council house.

He could hear someone outside in the meditation garden. He checked the downstairs first because if they were in here, they were probably supposed to be here. He found the self destruct disconnected. He found Mr. Pointy's case broken but there was a rose next to the carved stake. It hadn't been touched otherwise. He checked, the kitchen was whole so Andrew wouldn't kill anyone. He walked outside, spotting their mad gardener scrubbing some things off the memorial obelisk. "New names?" he asked quietly.

Xander looked at him and nodded. "Yeah. Three new names." Spike nodded. Xander finished chipping in one name then cleaned off the area. Then the next name got carved over with his special router. When he was done he washed the whole thing down and stood up, backing away from it. "I still do okay at that."

Spike nodded. "Bit tilted on the last one but good enough. Dru still living?"

"I think so. I haven't heard otherwise." They heard a car out front and went that way, finding Steve and Stark there. "Hey, guys."

"When are they coming back?" Stark asked, getting out and following them inside. Steve ghosted behind them.

"Tomorrow once I turn up the security system." Steve nodded, going to look around. He'd only been here once. Xander looked at Mr. Pointy's case and sighed. "Bob was here."

"Who's Bob?" Steve asked. He stared at the carved stake. "Her boyfriend?"

"She was Council raised. She wasn't allowed to even speak to boys," Xander said quietly. "He's a half demon who thought he loved her." He picked the glass pieces out. "I can replace the case later." He stepped back, nodding at the placement. "He changed the blown lightbulb. That was sweet of him."

"What was she like?" Steve asked.

"She was called when Buffy died but I did CPR." Xander looked at him. "She had some naive grace and was pretty stubborn. She had *one* outfit. She complained that Angel had ruined her shirt. Buffy fixed that so she had a few changes of clothes." Steve shook his head. "She wasn't ever allowed to go to school. She couldn't talk to boys. Her watcher hated that she played with some of the neighborhood kids who were a lot younger than her.

"She knew her duty and that was pretty much it. Dru killed her a year after she got called. That gave us Faith." Steve shivered. "We liked Kendra. She was a sweet young woman. Confused about a lot of things, but she put everything she felt into carving Mr. Pointy. That was all her frustrations and shattered dreams, all that. She gave it to Buffy before she left the first time. We always honor Mr. Pointy to help us remember the girls that went before and the lives they couldn't live."

Steve nodded. "It's a good thing to do. That way it can't happen again." He looked at Xander. "How can we help?"

"I need to go be a bigger target for a few days."

"Others hate that you managed to save them," Stark said from behind them. "Not affiliated."

Xander nodded. "Many of them have always hated me. What else is new? That's who shot at Sandra." Steve grimaced. "Is she still okay?"

"Yeah, she's good. I talked to her mom online the other day and she said Sandra's fine and only having a few nightmares." Xander nodded, walking off. "Are you still injured?"

"Yup. Unlike you, Bucky, and the slayers I heal like a normal guy." He grimaced. "I'll be fine. As long as the girls don't squeeze too hard around my stomach." He called. "It's me. The house is ready. I've fixed the obelisk so it's current," he sighed. He ran a hand over his hair, dislodging some marble dust. "Spike and I are here, and so are two people for Suzette who can help. Remember, the protections won't let anyone with taint out after dark." He hung up. Andrew opened the portable ring portal and let the girls troop through. Suzette squealed and ran to hug her father, climbing up him until he grabbed her and held on. The other girls smiled. "We can call parents later," Xander said, accepting hugs. "Are you guys okay?"

"Yup," was the mass consensus. They settled in to tell him about Missus Dru, who told them stories. The other vampires who had snuck in got talked about and how they disappeared. Bucky nodded at Steve. Who pulled him closer to give him a hug around Suzette.

Suzette looked up at her father. "He's okay. I made sure he ate and stuff, Daddy. Uncle Bucky needed to eat more."

"I'll eat more now that we're safer," he said. "You hug your dad and your new bear." Xander smiled. "It made her feel better."

"I'm sure it did. I'm glad I could find them." Andrew came through the ring last with the forgotten stuff and floating the stacks of sleeping bags and blankets. Xander put them up into the emergency supplies for him. He and Xander made sure the old base was tidied up then came back and let the portal fall before a vampire got through it. The girls were charming the two adults that did some of the same stuff they did. It was good to see.

Andrew handed him a short list and Xander nodded, going to put them on the obelisk. Andrew used the portable ring device to get to LA to pick up food for everyone. They could have pizza and chinese tonight and real food again starting in the morning. The girls decided to do the sleepover thing in the gym, bringing Stark and Steve with them. Not that Suzette let go of her father and she told the other girls how much cooler her daddy was than some regular dads. She and Larissa hung on him and cuddled.

Xander smiled when he came back in, finding everyone mostly asleep. He nodded at Bucky, getting a pat on the arm. "You good?" he asked.

"I'm okay. I need to send both uniforms out for cleaning." Xander smiled. "You?"

"Healing. Healing still sucks. Inana was sweet to help me with it." Bucky shook his head with a sigh. "She was good to me and Kate called her when Inana demanded."

"Ah, that's how that happened." He stared at him. "Hawaii still standing?"

"Don't know. I haven't seen the news in weeks."

"We can call."

"I... maybe I'll sell and find somewhere safer."

"That's not a bad idea," he agreed. Xander smiled. "Let's go check your injuries."

"I'm good. Worry about the little ones' injuries."

"They aren't. Beyond a few scrapes and one healing bite." He stared at him. "Even you can look weak today because the girls know you got hurt. Faith told them you got hurt protecting Sandra."

Xander nodded. "I've got to change my bandage in a bit. I'll let you help." Bucky smirked. "I can't reach one to clean it."

"Fine. Act like it's nothing."

"One is. The other two ache." He went to help Andrew carry food in. "They're crashed."

"They can eat when they get up." He went to get the regular groceries too. Connor and Gunn had both been really helpful. He'd have the girls send them thank you cards.

***

Bucky looked at Xander's injuries, grimacing. "I'm not a field medic but that looks nasty."

Xander looked in the mirror at his older one. "That's not an infection."

"We can hit an ER. I'll go with you to make sure you're safe."

"We can't leave them alone with the girls. They'll panic."

Faith strolled in, staring at the healing wounds. "Damn." Xander nodded, putting on neosporin and letting Bucky help him bandage them. "You good, X?"

"Good enough. I'll see my regular ER guy for them later this week if not."

"You can go."

"I can't go. The girls will panic."

"The girls won't panic. I can tell 'em you're getting the bandages changed. It's the truth." Xander shook his head but Bucky lifted him up and carried him off. "Bucky, all the leather's already been sent to the cleaners." He nodded, carrying Xander off. She grinned, going to get doors for them and car keys. Then she went to check on the girls. A few were up and wandering. "Andrew got you girls chinese for dinner. A few pizzas too." They headed that way. "Xander had to get some stitches checked. He'll be back in a few hours with Bucky driving." They hugged her and dug into the feast. One went to get the other girls up so they all dug in and went back into sleepover mode.

***

Bucky nodded at the doctor coming in. She was cute but seemed cold and unsmiling. "I think one may be starting toward infection."

"Not that uncommon. Sometimes his mermaid taint comes oozing out too," she said.

Xander smiled. "We love you too, Doctor Patricia."

"Of course you do. That's why you get injured, Xander."

"If I hadn't, they would've killed a few of the girls."

"That's why I'm not mad at you for this one." She looked at the uncovered injuries, including the graze. "You did good on your own. Lay back, let me look at your stomach again." He did that, leaning on his elbows. "All the way down please. You can't do situps until they fully heal." Bucky laughed. "He's done it before." She checked around them carefully, hearing him hiss. The second, newer one had stuff in it but that looked like mermaid blood. "Who did the stitches?"

"The ER in New Jersey before the agents rushed in to kill me," Xander said.

"Hmm. Messy. Must've been a student doc. Let me get one of the surgeons in to redo them?" He grimaced. "One I trust. Honestly." He nodded, relaxing again. She got the surgeon paged and came in to draw blood from him, making him whine. "Sorry but if it's infected we need to know. I know not to test you for anything else."

"Thanks, Doctor Patricia. That's why we like you."

"If I could've handled the girls going out to come home injured, I would've stayed one of the Council doctors." A surgeon came in. "You're not the one I called for."

"He's removing a ruptured appendix." He looked at the wound. "What's the black stuff?"

"I got exposed to mermaid taint," Xander said. "It's black from that."

"Are you demonic?"

"No. I'm fully human. I got exposed by a swim team coach. He wanted to win really hard. It bothers three chromosomes but when I'm exhausted or sick, it pops up better like any other problem in the blood does."

"Oh. All right." He got extra thick gloves and local anesthetic to work on them. "Your friend can wait outside.

"No, I can wait right here," Bucky said. "That way Xander makes it home because I doubt he'll be walking right after you're done."

The doctor grimaced but shrugged. "Move away from the sterile field then please." He moved up next to Xander's head. The doctor cleaned the area, making Xander hiss, then put sterile draping on it. "Was it some sort of dominance fight?"

"No, I took a bullet for a future slayer," Xander said. The doctor stared at him. "They were going to shoot a little girl for being born and I got in the way to save her."

"I'm sure your people will be happy."

"My people are the Council," Xander said. "I'm still fully human." He looked at Doctor Patricia, who shrugged. She was making notes in his chart. "It clipped the edge of my body armor and didn't go that deeply. They removed it in the ER in New Jersey a few days ago."

"That's fine. They didn't have a good hand at stitching." He frowned as he cleaned the area. "Does anything cut this black ooze easier than alcohol?"

"Water works. It's blood, Doctor," Xander said. He grimaced but rinsed it off, making sure none splashed onto him. Then he got restitched. Xander relaxed once he was done. "Thank you."

"Welcome. I'm sure Doctor Biggers here knows what sort of antibiotics works the best." He left to complain he had been asked to operate on one of *them*. They could hear him.

Xander got up, holding his stomach. He smiled and waved at the head of the ER. "He's sorry. I told him it was a taint from exposure but he believes I'm demonic."

"No, Mr. Harris, we know you're not. You had us do a DNA test to prove it once." He glared at the surgeon. Who huffed off. Xander got his prescription and t-shirt, letting Bucky sign him out so they could go back to the compound. They both had rooms in there and Xander's was still full of things he needed to fix. A hand-sweep cleared the bed off and Xander laid down on his side, one hand over his stomach.

"Thank you."

"Welcome," Bucky said. "Let me go check on Steve then go to bed." Xander nodded, already nearly asleep. Bucky snuck out and down to the gym. Steve was telling Larissa a story. "Go sleep, Larissa." She hugged him around the metal arm and ran back to her cuddling spot next to Suzette. "I'm going to sleep. My room's up on three near Xander's."

"Thanks, Bucky. I'll see you in the morning." He nodded and left him to guard the girls for him. Steve settled in to watch over them, getting up to soothe any nightmares like he would his daughter's. Suzette got up in the middle of the night, looking around. He waved her over, letting her climb into his lap. "Hey, sneaky."

"Daddy, why did you change your uniform?"

"Because I'm not going to be Captain America if they do things like this."

"Oh." She leaned her head against his shoulder. "Are you going to change back?"

"I don't know. I might. Would that upset you?"

"No. I liked the blue suit. It was pretty. The one with all the stripes looks confusing. It looks like a parody of stuff."

"Hm. That's the one I wore back in the war."

"Really?" She looked up at him. "That's weird." She snuggled in. "Are we going home soon?"

"Three days to make sure it's still safe." She yawned but nodded. "I'm not leaving. Go cuddle up with Larissa." She snorted but wrapped one of his arms around her. So he sat there with her in his lap for the rest of the night. It was comforting them both. Stark took over nightmare duty so he wouldn't have to move. Just sit there and cuddle her until they both felt safe again.

***

Steve carried Suzette into the kitchen the next morning. Bucky was sniping at Xander in Italian. Xander was yelling back in an African language he didn't recognize, just the cadence to it. "Why are they fighting?" he asked Andrew.

"Bucky caught Xander in the gym," Andrew said, sipping his coffee. "He's yelling at him about not taking good care of himself, and I think he compared him to you a few times. Xander's yelling back that he's fine. He doesn't know Italian but he knows what the argument's about." He looked at Steve. "They're using languages the other doesn't understand so no one gets pouty about it later."

"I do not get pouty," Bucky and Xander both said in English. Andrew grinned at their scowls.

"I'm going to take the advice of those little old ladies and tie you to the bed!" Bucky said.

"Like hell you will. I'll run so far you'll never see me this close again." Xander sipped his coffee. "I was working on my arms, not my stomach. I'm not stupid."

"No, just more stubborn than the king of that land," he said with a point at Steve. "Even he wouldn't be in the gym with two gut shots." He noticed Steve didn't say anything and stared at him. "I know you're not *that* bad usually."

"They were mostly healed," Steve said.

"Boys, quit fighting and feed us girls," Suzette complained. "We're all really hungry and I'm going to start chewing on Daddy soon."

Steve looked down at her, grinning. "I'm not that nutritious."

"Uh-huh. You're probably filling. Meat is muscle tissue and it's really filling so you will be too." Andrew took her and pointed her at the breakfast buffet bar. "Cool! Firsties!" She dug in, loading up a plate. A few of the other minis, including Larissa, ran in since they were done showering and loaded up their own food. Andrew pointed toward the dining area so they ran in there to eat and talk. Steve shook his head at the 'of course her daddy's here; he can beat HYDRA so he can beat any bad guys that show up now' from Larissa.

Andrew punched Steve on the arm with a grin. "You're liked for that."

"Yes I am." He got coffee and a modest plate of food. Andrew added to it then made plates for Bucky and Xander.

"'Drew, I'm not hungry yet," Xander said.

Andrew stared at him. "Were you turned?"

"No, Inana nibbled on me for other reasons," he said dryly. "I had a donut before going to the gym." Andrew handed him a plate with real food and gave him a look before walking off to check on the other girls. Xander sighed but dug in. "Yes, Andrew."

They watched as Andrew's automated stove finished cooking some eggs and tipped them into the container waiting on them. Then an automated pitcher shook a few times and poured more scrambled egg mixture onto the hot grill top, letting the cover come down. The specially cobbled together sixteen slice toaster shot toast out onto a preset plate, which tossed it over to the buffet line. The eggs were being slowly trundled over by belt chain and dumped into their right spot. Then the pan went back to catch the next batch of eggs. Bacon was being done the same way with some sausage links. The industrial size coffee maker was being filled by a rotating set of coffee pots. There was a little arm that put in and removed things that looked like giant K-cups into each pot for brewing. The used ones got tossed into the sink to be cleaned and refilled.

Steve stared at Xander. Who smiled while chewing. "I'm guessing Andrew customized," Bucky said. He got more hot water for tea and settled in to watch Steve and Xander eat.

Stark came in and saw things moving, watching the automated processes. "Andrew, how did you do this?" he called.

"Necessity is the mother of getting always hungry young slayers fed," he called from somewhere. "Xander, I'm out of baking supplies."

He sighed. "Order it and I'll go pick it up, 'Drew."

"Thank you. It'll be a big one. I'm out of everything, even butter." Xander grunted, stuffing his mouth again.

"I'll go pick it up so the stubborn asshole can rest," Bucky said.

"Sure, you can go heft the hundred pound barrels of flour and sugar," Xander quipped with a grin. "Have fun with that." Bucky stared at him. Xander nodded with a grin. "Borrow my truck if it's still here. Rent a u-haul if not."

Andrew came up. "We're out of laundry detergent and a few other things too. Bucky, would you mind picking up the list?"

"Sure, I guess I can do that."

"Rent a u-haul," Xander said. Andrew hit him on the arm. "I know how much my pickup holds. It won't hold the flour, sugar, and butter."

"Good point. I'll get you a rental truck." Andrew called their favorite rental truck people to do that. "I got you the big one and the handtruck," he said, coming back. Bucky stared at him. Andrew stared back. "It's easier." Xander nodded quickly and stuffed his mouth. "You, go clean those. Even I can see one's seeping."

"It's seeping mermaid taint."

"Even worse; black, oozy blood instead of red staining your shirt." Xander rolled his eyes but went to change his bandages. Andrew smiled at Steve. "I am the housemother. My word is law."

One of the older girls leaned in. "Andrew, can we catch up on Game of Thrones?"

"Not with the really little kids in the house. I can't imagine how bad the nightmares would be."

"Point." She grimaced. "If we take over the senior gym?" He nodded. She ran to set that up, tell everyone breakfast was ready, and get the senior girls to bring theirs up for the watching party. The younger girls settled in to watch girlish tv shows and giggle about My Little Pony. Bucky wisely disappeared since he spotted Larissa looking at rope. Steve didn't manage to disappear fast enough but she just led him into the gym they had so they could curl up around him.

Andrew smiled at Stark, who was examining his automated breakfast system. "It's really handy and any leftovers get eaten as snacks." The bigger girls ran back in for seconds, with a few of the younger girls interrupting to get their own. Andrew put on more eggs and toast for them. The girls squealed at the automated system and got fresh, hot things to take back to the gym.

Stark patted Andrew on the shoulder. "That's better than I could do. I'd forget to feed them sometimes. I forget to feed me sometimes." He went to check on the rest of the house to see what else had been automated. There were two automated bunnies that had water spewing out of their tails to water the trees and bushes as they hopped around. He spotted another on the other side of the house. He spotted a deer by the fence doing the same thing, spraying the reporters out there through the bushes. They were shrieking about it. Tony smiled, going back inside to look at other things. Each gym now had a tv hooked up to a computer for the viewings. The gym had Xander working on his arms. "Did you change your bandages?"

"Yup. Now I'm going to finish working on my arms. Then I'm going to go shoo the reporters off."

"They're being wet down by the deer."

"Have you seen Natalie?"

"Not today."

"She must be with Giles at his house in England." He went back to his workout. They both heard when Bucky got back, he was complaining a lot about how heavy flour was when pastries were so light and flaky. Xander went to hide from him. Stark grinned and pointed when Bucky leaned in.

Bucky headed up to Xander's room, finding him mending crossbows. He settled in to help him and make sure he would actually rest now. Before he had to tie him down for real.

***

Suzette came off the elevator at Avenger Tower. "We need ice cream," she announced.

"We've got pie," Bruce said, taking her to hug.

"Pie's cool. I like pie." She smiled at Darcy. "I'll hug you once the uncle isn't an octopus anymore."

"Uncles are supposed to be octopuses when you've been gone for a while," Darcy said. "Is she okay, Steve?"

"Pretty good. She could use a nap since the girls have been up for two days watching videos." She grinned at that. Bruce let her free and Darcy snatched her to cuddle.

Stark came off the elevator, smiling but shaking his head. "Now we know what summer camp was like."

Steve grinned. "We do, but they didn't have a pond." Suzette grinned at them. "C'mon, let's rest, then we'll have dinner and pie, and then we'll cuddle?"

She looked at him. "How can I cuddle everyone at once if we're not all piled on the floor to watch tv?"

"We can pass you back and forth," Darcy said. She gave her a squeeze and let Natasha have her to hug since she was stomping their way.

"Hi," she said, cuddling her and waving at Uncle Clint. "I'll hug you in a minute."

"That's fine. I know not to take things from Natasha. Even cute little ones."

Natasha let him take her then sat down and took her back once Clint was done. "Did you learn anything new while you were camping with the slayers?"

"MRE's are gross." Everyone nodded, settling in to listen. "Andrew kinda drives himself nuts making everyone food if he doesn't have some help. Some of us got to help him cook. He only yelled once for a girl using a knife the wrong way. She was going to get hurt and he cuddled her for making her cry. We learned stuff from Missus Dru. She showed up to tell us about being a mean, scary vampire way back when. She told us about Spike too. The girls pounced him to ask him about some of the stuff she said. He groans really pretty."

She grinned a mean grin. "Missus Dru's vampy kids were kinda weird but only a few tried to get in. One of the girls got turned but Uncle Bucky handled it and we all saw her name on the obelisk. There's a huge lot of names on there because of the First Evil." She sucked on her bottom lip, looking at her father then at everyone else. "It was pretty okay. We were all mostly safe and when we got scared we cuddled. Even Miss Buffy cuddled us until she left to go to that battle. Is she okay? She emailed but Faith said it didn't give any information."

"Yeah, she's fine. She's on a cruise around Europe," Stark said.

"Aww. She probably needed the relaxing time. She had no idea how to play games with us girls." She smiled at her father. Who grinned back. "It was okay. We were pretty safe and even the witches were nice to us. Though a few cried a lot but I'm not sure why. Mr. Wesley said that they were having emotional days and we should let them alone. He talks kinda funny."

"He's British," Stark said with a hand wave.

"He was mumbling something about having too many girls and it might be upsetting the balance. Bucky slugged him and told him to shut up. If the PTB wanted fewer slayers around, they could make the calling from 18 to 25 and then have it leave the girls. Not endanger little kids. Then he stomped off. He might've called Uncle Xander. I'm not sure. I know Mr. Wesley disappeared right after that. Uncle Andrew just shrugged when it was reported to him and called him a spy."

"He was sent back by the PTB," Steve told her. "He had died before the invasion in LA."

"Why? They have messengers. We met Cordelia. She praised most of us for our fashion sense. She said most of us had much better fashion sense than Miss Buffy does."

"We'll work on that as you get older," Natasha said. "She goes out in clothes that are not functional for patrol. Things like a skirt."

"You can't fight in a skirt?" Suzette asked her.

"I can but I pick mine with that in mind. She picks for how cute they make her."

"Oh. I guess she learned and we'll all learn too."

"I can help you with that when you're older." She smoothed down some hair. "Did you learn anything else?"

"Uncle Andrew told us about his former friends. How one was a bit mentally unstable and he died after killing Miss Willow's girlfriend Tara by accident when he meant to get Miss Buffy. We were all sad with him about his friend Johno dying before the First Evil. He really misses him still." Everyone nodded. "Faith gave him a hug and he smiled at her and said it'd be okay. Some day they'd meet up and build something to go blow up the Powers That Be for being dicks." Her father gave her the same dirty look she got the last time she said that word. "They are."

"Still not a polite word. Did you get to call Peggy?"

"Nope. Can we do that tonight?"

He checked his watch. "Sure." She grinned and wiggled some, hugging Natasha again. "We can do that before dinner. That way we know she's awake."

"Okay." She looked up at Natasha. "We had fun. Andrew had some stuff for us to do. We got to play with some of the demon classification stuff. Faith taught us about the petting thingies that like slayers to be owners. Including the demonic hair dog and the slime puppy like we had come onto the playground at my last school." She nodded with a smile. "There's a huge petting thing. She said it's the basis for bigfoot and abominable snowman rumors. She said they're really sweet and one nearly followed her all over Germany to be petted. She said it was sweet so she introduced it to one of the minis over there. She's happily cooing over him and helping his fur get unknotted. He really likes her and he follows her to school and stuff. Her teacher must be really cool."

"They must be," Stark agreed. "Or really tolerant." She grinned at him. "What else did you learn?"

"I learned not to do something if Andrew tells us not to. Bad people used to use the base and he told us not to go into some of the areas but we snuck off and it was gross. There were blood stains and stuff. We didn't want to see that. We had icky dreams and had to make Faith cuddle us."

"Why not cuddle Andrew?" Clint asked.

"Because some girls said it wasn't right to cuddle guys that weren't relatives and kept complaining if we did until Faith took them aside. That and he slept by himself so we couldn't pounce him in there. I'm not sure if Uncle Bucky slept at all. He'd let us hug but then we had to run off again since he was guarding us."

"He's still crashed," Steve said. She grinned and waved at him. "Hi. What are you doing, silly?"

"I'm waving at the ghosty lady behind you, Daddy. Hi, Miss Cordelia."

"Hi, precious." She smiled down at Steve, winking at him. "Got a proposition for ya."

"How bad?" He got up and took her to the hallway so the others wouldn't hear. "How bad? You have that 'I'm going to destroy them look' Natasha sometimes gets."

"Yes, I will be. They want a certain male someone calmed down. Like in a permanent relationship. I won't say his name because he'll show up and the PTB thinks he doesn't need to know yet."

"Why would that bother me?"

"Because the only one who might be able to tie him down and make him see sense is your buddy, who you have the lusties for." Steve winced. "So you can choose them all. Because there's a sweetie that they had planned to be the creamy filling for you two if you wanted. A reward for services and all that."

"I'm not a reward that can be given," Darcy called. She leaned into the hallway with a smirk. "You can tell them to stay out of my panties. If I want to pounce him, I'll do it on my own. I'm not a medal for good combat skills."

Cordelia snickered. "I know you're not. They're planning on pushing soon. Probably something like a stuck elevator."

Darcy shook her head. "No. Thank you anyway. If he wants me he's a big boy and can proposition me."

"Yes I can," Steve said. "I haven't really thought about that with Bucky either."

She looked up then at him. "I just heard the word 'clueless' applied to your name. That's probably a bad thing." He grimaced. "So...they're at least giving you a choice." She looked up with a frown. "What's that? How did he get a viral bomb up there?" she muttered. Then she flinched. "Okay, there's three less powers now," she said, then winced. "They're really going to push for him to settle down now." She took a deep breath. "Xander's in a cranky mood. Can you cure that for him?"

"I've never even thought about it, Cordelia. Sorry. Ask Bucky?"

"He's already been appointed. Did he always nag that way?"

"Yes. I used to be really sickly."

"Oh. That's good." She disappeared.

"The nerve of higher beings," Darcy sighed. "I'm not a toy."

He grinned. "There's times to treat your lady like she's your favorite plaything but not in public." She blushed and swatted him on the arm, walking back out with her. "Sorry, the higher ups had *ideas*." He called Bucky, walking down the stairs. "It's me. Did you help Xander blow up some of the Powers That Be for almost mandating that you two screw and then I take you both and probably Darcy in?" He paused while Bucky spluttered. "Cordelia showed up. How did he get that explosive thing up there?" He listened.

"Oh, Andrew did and went on a ranting fit that next time he was sending Xander up there in person. Okay, thank him for me. What are you guys doing this week? I think we should at least talk, maybe make plans. They were talking about stranding us in elevators and stuff. No, you, me, him, and Darcy." Bucky let out a deep moan of pain-sounding noise. "Yeah. So we should probably make plans just in case." Bucky apparently said that to someone and Xander yelled he had things to solve their backed up colon problem so their brains would work right again.

Steve felt a pull but resisted it. "I don't know, Bucky. Let me know? Thanks." He hung up and banged his head against the wall a few times. He decided to be snarky for a few minutes and called Agent Coulson. "It's Steve Rogers. Are you busy?" He smiled. "No, letting you know some higher ups have ideas. Including the Powers That Be liking the idea of your nephew, me, Bucky, and Darcy together." The quiet 'interesting' was a bad sign. "I thought Xander could probably use some help getting away from this before more than Andrew sent them explosives. Exactly. I had to warn Bucky.

"Cordelia came to propose it to me and warned they were going to try. Hey, all the merrier for the help. Thanks, Agent Coulson." He hung up and banged his head again before going up there. "We'll see what we can do to avoid that. Andrew sent something that went boom," he finished quietly next to Darcy's ear. She laughed and patted him on the arm. "I warned Bucky and he told Xander. I warned Agent Coulson so he could help us avoid it."

"How pushy would they be?" Stark asked. "Like stranding you four during a storm that would take down some of the east coast?"

"I don't know. You'd have to ask Xander or Andrew," Steve said.

"That would definitely not get me hot or get their plans to happen," Darcy said. "I'm not that sort of girl."

Steve looked at his phone. "Bucky's response to this situation is filthy." He sent back one thanking him for agreeing with him and Darcy. And how was Xander taking it? He got back bomb plans. "Stark, how bad is this?" He let him see it.

Stark looked it over. "With his blood...really horrible." He called down there. "Stop him before someone else manages to get the plans and arrests him because they think it'll be against something human." He hung up and tossed the phone back to him. "I didn't know you could get those sort of things to a higher plane."

"Bucky once joked about doing a seance with the Commandos to see if they'd go talk to them." Steve smiled. "How hard is that to do?"

"Probably not very," Bruce said. "Is it a viable option is a better question." Phil came off the elevator with Pepper. "Evening. She's back." Suzette waved from her Aunt Darcy's lap. "We're waiting on dinner to finish."

Phil smiled at Suzette. "Are you okay?" She nodded. "That's good." He patted her on the head. He looked at Steve. "Xander's a bit ...angry."

"He's very angry and we stopped him from sending a bomb to the higher powers," Steve said.

"I did not hear about this bomb." Steve let him see the plans. "Compact. Where did he get the plans?"

"Probably from someone he fought in Africa," Stark said dryly. "There's probably a few of those."

"Probably," Phil sighed, handing the phone back. "What can I do to help beyond getting Xander materials for that device?"

"Xander said he may be selling his vacation home to get somewhere more secure," Steve said.

"I'm wondering if the portal will easily move," Phil said. Steve shrugged. He didn't know. "I think he should probably check that first since most of the witches are tired or now glowing heavily thanks to their misdeeds."

Steve sent that to Bucky, who said he'd mention it. Xander groaned and agreed it might not. Or the other protections. Maybe he'd just fix up his house then. Or maybe he'd create a better hiding hole. Steve pointed out he had a few of those he had inherited. Xander sent back that one was being sold to Inana. He didn't need a seaside villa in Greece. Seeing the water that often might make him want to let the mermaid taint out. "He doesn't have a sea view?"

"Mountains I think," Phil said. "Is he still worried about mermaid taint?" Steve nodded.

"Oooh!" Suzette squealed. "We saw one of those. They came up to try to eat a vampire so Missus Dru brought them to us for us to deal with. She looked so exasperated. Like when Daddy saw me coloring on the table by accident. They were kinda gross looking."

Steve leaned down to hug his daughter. "They're mean and they eat people."

"I know. Faith told us that. She said Uncle Xander had been exposed to one by a mean guy swim coach so sometimes he had black, oozy blood instead of red blood. If we saw that then he was really sick and we should be careful of it because it could soak into us too."

"It's always wise not to directly touch blood products," Phil said. "A glove is best but if you have to, a wadded up towel or t-shirt works as well to put pressure on injuries."

She grinned. "We learned first aid stuff too." She looked back at Darcy. "Do we do that around here?"

"That's one of Bruce's jobs sometimes."

She grinned at him. "Can you teach me more of that?"

"I sure can, sweetie. It can come in handy in every walk of life."

"Cool! Uncle Xander can do stitches. So can Uncle Bucky. One of the girls fell...well, we were jumping on the stairs for fun because we were bored, and she got herself good so he stitched her leg up."

"Your father jumps out of airplanes," Natasha said.

Suzette's eyes went wide and she stared at her father in awe. "Teach me that?" she begged.

He grinned. "When you're old enough."

"Cool!" She hugged him then turned to hug Auntie Darcy. "If the mean old Powers make you have adult stuff with Daddy that's okay. I won't mind because I like you and you're neat. If you were an idiot like one of my teachers I'd mind but you're nice so I don't mind. Even if you do have to cuddle Uncle Xander too. He's kinda cuddle phobic at times according to Faith."

"So's Bucky," Steve said. "That's something the adults will talk about later, sneaky one."

She grinned. "Just letting her know. That way she doesn't have to worry. She gets jumpy and starts messing up her hair when she's worried. Then she can't even make coffee. It nearly broke the coffee maker last time and I know that the coffee maker's like a holy artifact around here. Not nearly as pretty as the one that's in the house but still a holy artifact."

Stark nodded, grinning at her. "I pray to it many times a day. So does Barton." Clint nodded.

"Is Katie okay? We heard she got grounded and had to give up her apartment."

"Xander was there when she was grounded and I'm sure she's okay," Steve said. "I haven't seen her in a few days." He looked at Clint.

"She's still grounded but she snuck out to come have coffee with me and so we could practice some new stuff. Her dad's a bit frustrated because he didn't want a daughter who did all this hero stuff."

She sighed but nodded. "I can understand why. It's dangerous. Faith had a lot of scars from a few battles."

"We all have scars," Natasha said. "But we earned them doing something good so they're good to us."

She nodded. "That's what Faith said, kinda. She doesn't use the same sort of words you use, Natasha. She's from Boston and she talks a lot differently."

"Sometimes you young guys do," Steve said dryly. She giggled and wiggled, turning to pounce Darcy for a hug. She got cuddled back. "Why don't you go rest?"

"Because there's *pie* waiting, Daddy. I don't want to sleep through pie."

"We can have pie now. It's tea time," Darcy said.

"Cool! Help me call Auntie Peggy so we can have tea together?"

"I can do that," Darcy agreed, taking her into the kitchen to dish up the pie for everyone. She brought out coffee and the tea pot was still brewing so she brought that out last. "Just added, Pepper and Natasha." She called Peggy on her phone, letting Suzette have it so they could chat and 'have tea together' while she inhaled her pie.

Steve grinned, walking behind her to wave at Peggy. "She's finally home."

"I'm happy she could make it home. Are you well, dear?"

"I'm okay. I was a good girl and I learned a lot. But it was kinda boring." She grinned. "Aren't you having tea?"

"They do serve it late around here," she said with a smile. "I have no idea why." Suzette giggled and talked to her other favorite aunt-type person. The others had their pie and relaxed, making sure Steve was okay and calmer now too. They hadn't known Steve knew what brooding evil was until his daughter had to go away for her own protection.

***

"Which one is Darcy?" Faith asked.

Bucky looked up from eating a bowl of cereal. "Dark hair, pouty lips, busty. Helps Jane Foster, Thor's girlfriend." He stuffed more cereal in his mouth.

"Not evil so therefore not into me," Xander quipped as he came in from the backyard. "We'll need another memorial obelisk if we have another ten short names."

"Find us one," she said. "I doubt they've been nice enough to stop all apocalypse battles." Xander nodded, going to figure how to do that. Giles had gotten back this morning and was catching up on the paperwork because his metallic assistant Natalie had threatened to tie him to the chair and call Ethan to help her.

Bucky finished his cereal and put it where it belonged in the dish washer. Then he went to check on Andrew, who was stressed out for some reason. He found him trying to meditate and waited.

"What?" Andrew grumped.

"Wondering if you wanted to talk about the stress." Andrew stared at him. "Only a few cures for post battle stress if you're not a girl who can shop away the extra energy."

Andrew grimaced. "I tried that already."

"Then go out tonight. The girls can order since there's only four here."

Andrew sighed. "I shouldn't."

"Even you need a break. Don't make me sic Natalie on you too." Andrew grinned but blushed as he stood up. "Go, come back sometime tomorrow." He nodded, patting him on the arm as he walked around him.

Faith leaned on his metallic arm, grinning at him. "We have the same urges. We don't really wear them out with shopping but women learn how to get rid of our stress since most guys aren't that good at it." She strolled off. "Ladies, let's hit the mall," she called. "Andrew's got two days off so we're going to have to feed ourselves and not mess up his kitchen."

"McDonald's tonight then another one for breakfast," one of the remaining girls quipped. They skipped down to join her. They ran into Buffy coming in and brought her with them. She had to eat too, even if she did have that 'I had a fling and he knew what an orgasm was' glow around her.

Bucky watched Xander fuss over things. "You could probably do the same thing."

Xander looked at him. "What makes you think Inana didn't cure that already?" Bucky smirked. "I fuss, it happens. I've always been bouncy." He got back to fussing over things then went to clean up the kitchen. Andrew needed some sanity saving time off and Xander did actually know how to cook thanks to a few old job choices. He placed the food order and Bucky sighed but went to pick it up. It was a lot lighter to carry than the hundred pounds of flour and sugar Andrew had needed him to heft and carry.

***

Andrew came back and found his kitchen pristine. Everything was cleaned. Even the grills he hadn't gotten to yet. He looked around. "I expected smoke damage and maybe even water damage or crying girls." He went looking. "Xander, did you clean up your mess?"

Xander looked up from his book. "Ya know, I used to do cooking jobs as part time jobs back in Sunnydale. I also cooked at a strip club."

"They serve food at those?"

"Not that many eat there, but yup." He smiled. "I got them all fed. I made fritatas this morning and divvied them up like pies. They all got fruit. The fritatas had veggies. Mid-morning snack was the girls helping me make trail mix." Andrew leaned down to hug him. "You're welcome. Was it good?"

"No. No girls hit on me."

"I can call an ex."

"Please don't. They're usually mean." He went back to his kitchen, seeing what was able to be done for dinner. He found roasts resting in a marinade and veggies already chopped and in lemon water so they didn't turn brown. All he had to do was load the oven and toss the veggies into pans. "I love Xander. But not in that 'I'm a bad boy so you're mine' way." He looked at the portal, which was red. "Hey, Xander? I think Bucky's going evil."

Xander strolled that way, finding one of his ex's harassing him. "What are you doing?"

"Your pet guard dog here...." she started.

"Bucky isn't a *pet*," he sneered. "He's a friend. Apparently he realized what a dick you are even without knowing you."

"I really need to shove my fist through her skull," Bucky said.

Xander nodded. "I'd like to see that. She knows better than to taunt people. It's not nice."

"I'm not nice," she sneered. "You like that about me."

"Not really. The ones who are mine are always nice to those I care about, which includes Bucky, Andrew, and the slayers." She huffed and tried to shoot him so Xander picked her up and threw her.

She got up holding her back. "How did you do that!" she yelled. "You're not a super soldier."

"I haul around artillery and use a battle axe or a sword in battles. I used to work construction. I have more muscles than the average man," he said dryly. "Hike it. Now. You're clearly not worthy of being mine since you sneered at my friend. I don't allow that and I definitely don't fuck it." She shrieked and tried to find her gun but Bucky held it up with a grin. A cop car pulled in. "Officer, she insulted my friend and pulled a gun on us."

The officer grimaced. "Where's the weapon?" Bucky held it up. "Was she up there then?"

"Yup, then I threw her dumb ass." He stared at her. "You can stay if you want but if you do I'm going to tell him what you do for a living." She tried to rush them with a knife and Xander punched her back onto the lawn. "She's a virologist looking for samples. I found out she was working on bio bombs a few years ago after a mediocre weekend with her in Albania."

The officer nodded. "Aren't you that Council guy?"

"Yeah, I am."

"Are you renting?"

"No, I'm owning. And I can't move the protections or the emergency hatch so we're staying. That way you guys get protected." He smiled. "Thanks for asking. This is my coworker and really good friend. He even kept up with me while I was checking on the minis in Africa."

The officer nodded. "Okay. Sure." He picked the crying woman up. "Can I have her weapons please?" They gave them to him. "Are you sure that's what she does?" Xander came down to pat her down and found her car keys, popping the trunk. He pointed at the refrigerated sample case. "Can that be opened?"

"I'm not going to. I don't need another bad plague-like thing. You might ask Hazmat." She shrieked and tried to get free. "I told you not to fuck with me." He walked off. "You have fun with her, Officer. Really."

He called that unit in and got backup. Bucky went back inside. Xander sat on the porch with a glass of lemonade. "Hi, Steve," he called when their special task force's people got there. "We're back. Can we have our stuff back?"

"Later and we'll be talking about a few things." Xander went inside and came out with the certificate allowing him to hoard weapons. "We'll see." Xander smiled and held up the others. "Damn it."

"Yup." He grinned. "A lot of damn its. That's why I have the egg babies."

Steve nodded. "I'll bring them back tonight so we can start a formal inventory. That way no one has to wonder." Xander shrugged, going back to his seat. The precious letters went back into the frame laying there. Bucky came out to get it and put it back on the wall. Steve looked at the unit. "We need her fingerprint and the security code."

"862417. She uses it as her pin too," Xander quipped. Everyone stared at him. "One mediocre weekend in Albania, guys." They nodded and tried that. It worked and her finger was forced onto the fingerprint pad. They looked at the vials. Then someone started to call for a Navy expert. Xander came down to look. "All those are sealed. They're frozen so quieted down. The only one that could pass on is this one," he said with a point at it. "Which would suck if she had a car crash."

Bucky walked him off. "You don't need a plague on top of the malaria you got last trip to Africa." He put him back into his seat, handed him the lemonade, and went back inside.

Steve stared at Xander, hands on his hips. "You had what?"

"No. Comment," he said in Russian. Then he smiled. "Ever."

"Should I be aware that could be a future problem?" he asked in Chinese.

"Yes," Bucky called in Chinese. "It would be if they knew."

"Okay then. We're handled or something?" he asked Xander. Who shrugged and took another drink through his straw. "Xander?"

"Protections mean that you can't bleed me if I'm unconscious."

"Ah. Good!" He nodded. "Excellent in fact." The Navy doctors got there. He pointed. They moaned and took the samples, unhooking the case to hook up into their jeep instead. Then they zipped off. The nice germ doc got taken to jail. Steve and Danny went to get Xander's stuff back for him and do an actual inventory. Which did not amuse Bucky. He hadn't seen most of those when he looked. Xander showed him the other doorway then went to help with slayer dinner time.

Bucky sighed, looking at Steve. "Sometimes he scares me."

"Me too," Danny agreed.

Steve shrugged. "He might need it some day. I heard he used a bio bomb to close a hellmouth once."

Bucky nodded. "I heard the same thing." He looked at the gear. "Now I know where to go if I need to stop a helicarrier on my own." He walked off. "He's with the slayers."

"Thanks," Steve called. They set everything back up the way Xander had it. Including the thermal grenades in the temperature controlled egg house. Though Steve had kept two of the egg babies for himself. He could definitely use them.

***

Bucky decided he was unlucky about a week later when Suzette and Steve came to Hawaii. Xander didn't invite them or anything but they came for a vacation. Bucky met them at the airport so they wouldn't have to get a cab. Suzette squealed and ran over to climb him, giving him a hug. "Hey, sprout." She grinned and cuddled, waving at her father. A few people started to stare. Steve looked nervous. "Bags?" Bucky suggested to snap Steve out of looking for problems coming their way. "I've got her."

Steve nodded and grabbed their two bags, following him to Xander's old truck. They climbed and drove off before a news van showed up. Bucky showed them the important things on the way, like the hospitals. Steve grinned at him. They made it back to the house in time to find McGarret in there complaining about gun running thugs to Xander, who was looking up something online. "Bad time for visitors?" Bucky asked as they walked in.

"No. One of my ex's is being annoying," Xander sighed. "That's her default setting though." He grinned at the kid who interrupted his searching, giving her a hug. "Let me search her out."

"Her?" Steve McGarret asked. "She sure looks male."

"Trannie," Xander said. "Going to female." Steve huffed. "Introduce yourselves, people. We all know I only pretend to have manners. Kitchen's that way, Steve." He pointed and went back to typing around Suzette. Who was very helpful. She pointed out a link he had missed, it was misspelled.

"Hi, Steve Rogers," he said, holding out a hand.

"Commander Steve McGarret, US SEAL, sir. It's an honor," he said, shaking his hand. "On vacation?" Steve nodded. "We'll try to keep some of the bad things down then." He grinned. "I try really hard."

"Steve got bumped to the local major crimes task force thingy," Xander said as he worked. "To get the guy that killed his dad. Who was a former cop too." Steve nodded.

Suzette got free of Xander and came over to introduce herself. "Hi, I'm Suzette."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Suzette. My partner has a daughter about your age." She grinned. "I'll see if she wants a new penpal. She doesn't get to see too many kids outside the classroom."

"That'd be nice. I have friends who could write her too."

Steve smiled. "That's always a great thing." He texted Danny, who sent back an answer and then a minute later an agreement with an address. He wrote it down for her. "Here, this is his daughter's address. She's got chicken pox this week."

"That sucks. It itches," she agreed. "Larissa had it last year and she was miserable for over a week."

"It is, I had it when I was six." She grinned. Xander handed over papers. "Can I bum?"

"She got me discounts on some of it. She'll know."

"Pity. Thanks. It's a pleasure meeting you both, sir and Suzette." He shook their hands again and left.

"And you'd better be taking care of the egg babies you kept," Xander called after him.

"I am," McGarret called back.

Xander relaxed, grimacing. "I'm not sure if they're doing it on purpose or not."

"They might be searching for attention," Bucky said. He sat down. Suzette climbed into his lap to hug him again. "I'm not really cuddly, Suzette."

"Bullshit. Daddy said you used to help him by cuddling him when he got sick from being too cold."

"Language," Steve said dryly. "I'm going to break you of that habit yet."

She shrugged and cuddled in again. "I'm trying to be good. Uncle Bucky is just too pretty and he's inspiring bad girl thoughts. All the big slayers said so." Bucky groaned, looking at Xander.

"We carefully ignore anything but photoshopping and sneaking into showers to get pictures. The girls are going to crush on someone and we're around them all the time so it's usually us first and then other boys. Well, boybands usually come first. Then us, then real guys they can flirt with."

Steve sat down. "I'm sure Tony would say the same thing."

"He might enjoy it," Bucky complained. Suzette laughed. "You two can take my room while you're here."

"We've got rooms at a bed and breakfast up the street a bit," Steve said, handing that reservation sheet over.

"That's about two miles away," Bucky agreed. "We can get you there and then back here once you're settled in." Suzette cooed at him. He looked down, finding her asleep. "I didn't know I had that sort of magical gift," he said quietly.

"We gave her something on the plane ride so she could sleep," Steve said quietly, taking her back. "It's a long flight from New York."

Bucky nodded. "It probably is. I don't think I've flown it the regular way." Xander grinned at him. "Probably about as long as you going to Africa."

"Just under eleven hours to get here with the time changes," Steve said, looking at Xander.

"Twenty hours with two layovers," he said. "No direct flights from Cleveland and one flight was delayed due to a ramp problem. They estimated just over nineteen hours. The travel site nicely had a warning that said 'arrives the next day'. After that, we set up portals and had magical emergency stuff."

"Were you at least not in economy class smashed in like sardines?" Steve asked.

Xander shook his head. "Giles wouldn't spring for the upgrade. He thought business class was economy and it'd be fine. As he put it, he was when he came over from England."

"That's probably about the same as New York to Hawaii," Bucky said. "At least you got to have a few times to get up and stretch your legs during layovers."

"Jogging to change gates," Xander joked with a grin. "Thankfully I brought stuff to snack and I could get drinks quickly from the fountains."

"I'm sore just thinking about that," Steve admitted. He looked down. "Let's get us checked in, Bucky, and then back here?"

"Sure." He got up and found the car keys, taking them to the bed and breakfast. He waited in the truck while they checked in and got stuff sorted. An officer knocked on his window so he rolled it down. "I'm just dropping off a few friends who flew in today."

"That's fine, sir. People were wondering since this truck isn't really what you'd expect to see here."

"She's seen service but she's a good truck." Steve and Suzette came out, her bouncing along in front of her father. "Thanks for checking, Officer." He started the car and rolled back up the window. Suzette climbed in first then Steve. He drove off. He just barely heard the officer go "fuck, that's Captain America" as they drove off. He knew Steve heard by the sigh. Bucky smirked at him. "They give you the princess bed instead of her?"

"She's got a trundle."

"That's cool. I remember those." Suzette hugged him around the chest under his arm. "You're a good girl but let go so I can drive." She did and turned on the radio, frowning at what came up. "It's his favorite station in Africa." He hit a button so it'd pick up local stations instead. She searched until she found modern music. Both adults let her. They had no idea how to tell her no about most anything not dangerous. He took them sightseeing after getting some gas. That way they could relax and so could Xander.

***

Late that night, Bucky got woken up by a noise. He listened and grimaced toward Xander's room. He hoped he was having some solitary fun but it sounded like two people panting. He got up to carefully check in there. Nope, two people and Xander unconscious. He grabbed one before they knew he was there and hurt them hard. The other tried to stab him with a needle but it didn't really do anything to his metal arm. They got knocked into a wall too. He sniffed. "Knockout gas. No wonder I slept through it." He called McGarret. No answer. He called Danny.

"It's Barnes. We have two people here who used knock out gas to hold Xander unconscious while trying to take his blood. No, they could use ambulances," he admitted. "No clue. Never seen them before. I don't think he's dated them. Please. I tried his first, no answer. Thanks, Danny." He hung up and went to open the front door. That shocked the bodyguard smoking on the porch. A backhanded punch and they fell down too. Bucky shook his head. "I'd expect minions to be tougher," he said when Danny got out of the car. "Found him when I opened the door."

"I got backup coming." He came up to look, sniffing. "What's that acidic smelling stuff?"

"Knockout gas."

"We can take him to the ER." Bucky shook his head. "We should."

"He won't let himself be taken to an ER he doesn't know."

"Oh, one of those."

"He's paranoid for a good reason."

"Figures." McGarret jogged up the stairs. "You swimming this late?"

"I was skyping with Catherine." Danny nodded and sighed. He sniffed. "Cheap knockout gas. We can take Xander to the ER."

Bucky shook his head. "He'll fight and escape."

"Okay." He went in to look at him. "It looks like they ruined a few needles."

"He has protections up so he can't be bled while he's unconscious."

"What's in there?" Steve asked. "I'm sure you got it tested somehow." Bucky went to get the results to show him, making Steve grimace. "These his ex?"

"Not that I'm aware of."

"So someone told." He handed them back. "I never saw those."

"Me either." He put them back and resealed the safe then came out to look at the paramedics. "Wow, I didn't know that two evil fucks were paramedics. I thought you just hung out on boats in the Riviera." Bucky would ignore that he had just sounded like Tony Stark mocking someone. One flinched. "So why are you here?"

"The old president asked a Mr. Finn what happened to Mr. Harris' blood. He admitted he had fallen into an old tomb back in Sunnydale over one thanksgiving and got sick from the ghosts. Then the former president told a few people. They're not his ex's," he told McGarret with a smile. "But I am. Boys, deliver my courting present to Xander and then help the locals remove these dorks. We like McGarret. He's like a fully trained yet slightly saner Xander." They did that and helped carry out the minions. He smiled at Bucky. "Would you like a list?"

"I would if he doesn't," McGarret said. "How many of you are here right now?"

"We're blatantly stalking him to make sure he's safe. Inana told us to and we don't want to piss her off. We're pretty sure she'll have us eaten and then tortured. We do not disappoint Inana. Even Xander doesn't disappoint Inana." Bucky nodded, but grimaced.

"What field is she in?" Danny demanded. "Arms, drugs? Bombs?"

"She's a former goddess on her realm. She ran here to escape the new religion that was trying to overthrow her. She's an eighteen-year-old goddess," one of the minions quipped with a grin. "Not traditionally pretty with her nose but she's apparently fantastic to Xander."

Bucky moaned, turning to thump his head on the wall. "Is she dangerous to the slayers?"

"No, she loves the slayers. She was the patron goddess of girls like Amazons on her home realm. A mean male god tried to take over," the head bad guy said with a smile. "So she's recovering until she can go home and overthrow him back."

"Better than Alara at least," Bucky quipped. All the bad guys shuddered. "She wants Xander to be her general. He said me and Steve could go so he had someone to sip beers with."

The bad guy patted him on the shoulder. "We heard Dawn complaining about the higher powers' plot. She was cackling because she talked to Inana. Inana wouldn't *mind* much but then again she might remind you of Darcy Lewis anyway. Except the nose." He leaned down to kiss Xander, making him scowl at him. "Someone broke in and knocked you out to try to take blood, precious."

"Why are you in a uniform?" he mumbled.

"I'm helping remove the problems." He smiled. "I told Bucky about Inana." Xander grunted. "No, stay down. They had knockout gas." He went limp but nodded, mouth flopping open. "Aww, they gave you goofy drugs with it. It's okay, you can sleep it off. A few of us are on vacation and we're going to watch over you. Okay?" Xander shook his head with wide swings. "I'm sorry but tough." He took another kiss and winked. "Inana really liked Darcy Lewis. Dawn told her. She's not happy that they're trying to force things but she does like Miss Lewis a lot. Said she reminded her of her." Xander moaned. "You rest, precious." He winked and strolled off. "Boys, are they sorry?"

"Yes, sir," one of his minions reported, pointing at the other bad guy that had shown up. "He's asking one of them who hired them."

"Aww. Thank you, Peter."

He grinned. "Welcome. Xander and Bucky?"

"Knockout gas with some goofy drugs." Peter went in there to get a kiss, making sure not to get any blood on Xander, then went back to his questioning.

"They're supposed to be in custody," Danny called after him.

"The officer is ours too," Peter quipped. "Thanks, Thomas."

"Welcome. Let me know if I can help more." They faded into the night, delivering the victims to the ER.

Peter finished up his questioning when McGarret came out. "Long time no see," he quipped with a grin. "Are you seeing Xander right now?"

"No, I'm still dating Catherine casually. Boys like Xander need long-term care, not something quick. When did you turn?"

"When the CIA told me to." He smirked at Danny. "Detective Williams, I've heard some about you on the SEAL bulletin board. Thanks for trying to make him sane. He doesn't do it very well on his own."

"I try but sometimes it's a full time job. You're a SEAL?"

"I am. I got recruited by the CIA."

"So this is official stuff?" Danny demanded, pointing at the person.

"Yup. The new head of my section is one of Xander's ex's." He smiled. "He's very worried about Xander but is quite happy that Inana's protecting him too."

"We just heard about her."

"Feel lucky she usually stays in Turkey. She's a bit...distracting. Like a chaos mage is a bit troublesome at times but a bit distracting." He smiled and handed over his victim. "Here, he wants to tell you who hired him."

"Thanks. Go home?"

"I'm on vacation."

"We heard," Danny said.

"It's my assignment, guys. I can't say no to the boss or I don't get paid." He smiled and left after a salute at Bucky, who tossed him some baby wipes. "Thanks, Barnes." He walked off happier.

Danny looked at Steve, who was shaking his head. "We'll talk later. Bucky, you got it?"

"Yeah, I got it. It's about time for my alarm to go off anyway so I can go for my morning run." Steve grinned, leaving with the torture victim and his partner. Bucky settled on the porch, calming down. He looked up. "I'm kinda glad you didn't give Steve girlfriends like that but they suit Xander better. Just make 'em nicer? Please?" He heard Xander moving. "Go back to bed. I've got it, Xander."

"I'm fine." He came out to collapse into his chair. "I'd like nicer ones too."

"Hyena senses up?" Xander nodded, sipping the coffee he had stopped to get. "We'll figure it out. Peter was here."

"Aww." He took another drink and put the cup down on the table beside him. He slowly fell asleep so Bucky took the coffee so it wouldn't go to waste. When his alarm went off he went to turn it off and came back out. The neighborhood stray dog and cat were both on Xander's lap again. He took a picture for the slayers. They'd enjoy that. Bucky got to look up the list of Xander's ex's and lovers. Starting with Inana so he could spot her when she showed up. She had a nice file thanks to Turkish Intelligence who hated she was a goddess from another realm. Especially that she walked around in flimsy clothes that looked like something a partying Greek would wear. And yeah, that nose had to come from something else. It was human shaped but put Cyrano to shame. She was really pretty otherwise.

***

Bucky handed Steve a folded set of papers before handing Suzette a jump rope. She squealed and looked it over, taking it figure out. It wasn't like hers at home. It was thicker and didn't have plastic handles.

Steve looked at the list with pictures. "His dates?"

"His ex's." He pointed. "Harmless goddess from another realm. She was over their amazons. That's Inana."

"Huh. I'll have to see if Natasha knows her."

"I emailed those to her." Suzette came to look. "Some of Xander's former lovers have shown up recently. This way your dad knows in case they like him too."

She kissed her father on the cheek. "They'd better be at least as nice as Darcy is." She went back to jumping rope. She spotted one and tipped her head, then smiled and waved. "Uncle Xander's at home," she called.

"I'm watching over you guys just in case, Suzette." Steve stood up to look at him. "Most of us are huge fans of yours, Captain, and we'd never let anything happen to your baby girl." He grinned at him. "Even the HYDRA douchebags won't be back anytime soon. They decided to go play with the local mermaid colony." Steve shuddered but sat down. The former boyfriend strolled off once he had his shaved ice. He could watch from father away. He saw Bucky staring and went farther away. Bucky was the only person who was as protective as Xander was so he didn't worry about them.

"Want to go see the ship and the Pearl Harbor memorial?" Bucky asked. "I almost went before but I couldn't."

Steve nodded. "We can do that tomorrow. Today, let's just relax. There's a pig roast thing on the beach tonight we bought tickets for. There's an extra one for you." Bucky smiled and nodded. "Fire dancers and all sorts of stuff they said."

"That'll be nice." Suzette pounced him. "You're so silly."

"Yes I am," she quipped, hugging him around the chest. "I'm silly like Daddy was."

"Hopefully you get in less fights than your dad did. He was always getting into fights."

She laughed. "He scowls at me for that." Steve nodded.

"It's a dad thing," Bucky said dryly.

She grinned and climbed into her father's lap to hug him. "We should've brought Larissa."

"She couldn't come. Her mother wouldn't let her. You know that because you asked before talking to me about it."

"Oops."

"Uh-huh." He hugged her. "Go play?"

"There's nothing to play with." He pointed at the playground. "That's baby stuff."

"It's not baby stuff," Bucky said. "There's ways to use the equipment so you're doing it for bigger kid things." She sighed but went to play on the play equipment. Bucky looked at Steve.

"She's used to playing on the training equipment in the gym," he admitted. "Especially the climbing stuff Clint and I use."

Bucky nodded. "I remember seeing it and seeing her walking the tightrope part." Steve nodded. They heard her yelp then burst out crying, going to see how badly injured she was. "We can go get that treated." He let Steve pick her up and got the jump rope and her sandals she had kicked off. They went to the ER and the nurse got Suzette to smile and quit crying for a few minutes while they talked. Thankfully it wasn't a busy day today. She got her cast for her ankle fairly quickly after the x-rays were done. Then they went back to Xander's so he could fuss over her. He was good at that.

***
Part 2 by Voracity2
When they all got back to Avengers tower a week later, Bucky dragged Xander off the first elevator, plopping him into a stand-alone chair. He grinned at Darcy. "Either of the dynamic duo of assassins here?"

"Natasha, visitors," she called. "She's got a date thing she said." She grinned at Xander, who smirked back. "Were you naughty?"

"All I did was dance with the hot guy at the club."

Bucky stared at him. "Who is a world famous assassin."

"I know. I had his help when I had to steal something from that demon." Bucky groaned.

Steve came off the elevator with Suzette riding his back. Darcy jumped up. "What happened?"

"She fell off some play equipment." He put her down so Darcy could hug her.

"You poor thing. Did you get hurt?"

"Just broken," she said with a pout. "We got to see fire dancers. And the group that wanted to sacrifice Uncle Bucky to a volcano god because they thought he was a pure maiden and they wanted Uncle Xander to themselves." Bucky moaned, shaking his head. Xander patted him on the arm, getting swatted for it. Xander swatted back. "Break it up, you two, before I have to bounce on both of you with the cast." She grinned at her favorite aunt. "It's okay. They're being playful like puppies." She grinned at her dad then at her. "Are there cookies?"

"There's cookies, and a cake for later."

"Sweet!" she cooed, cuddling her auntie. "Let's go get cookies. Daddy yelled at me for trying to walk on my cast."

"You have crutches," Steve said, handing them over. She took them and hopped in there. Darcy stared at him. "It was the only thing keeping her off that foot."

"She's a kid, they should be playing." She went in there to help her steal cookies, getting Xander a few too. Bucky took them and the ones she tried to hand to Xander after that plate. "He can have some."

"No he can't. He's been bad. He's grounded."

Darcy snorted. "I'm the maker of the cookies and I said he could have some." She took the second batch back to hand back to Xander. "You nibble. Your hotty dance partner can't be any worse than my last date." She walked off.

Bucky stared at Xander. "Don't you dare bounce."

"Bite me," he said in Latin then ate one. "Darcy, you do this as good as Andrew does," he called. "Thank you."

"Welcome."

Clint walked out with a towel around his damp neck, shirtless, hair still dripping some and messed up. "What's up, guys? Hawaii get too hot?" Bucky handed over the sheets. "I thought she took him out."

"She put him in jail," Bucky complained. "Someone needs to take him out before he decides he owns Xander." Xander ate another cookie, staring at him. "He could."

"He won't. He's not into me topping." He ate another cookie. "You're awfully paranoid about who I date."

"Do the girls like you dating people like this?"

"They expect it," Xander said. "Not like sweet, kind, gentle people like me."

Darcy and Suzette came out with her glass of milk, Darcy setting it down where Suzette wanted to sit. She hugged Xander. "I like you but I'm a bit snarky and can be mean when necessary." She looked at the sheet. "Oh, hey, it is my last douchebag date. He nearly lost his gropey hand when I nearly tased him." She grinned at Clint, pointing at the kid. "Shouldn't you be not fully naked?"

He looked down then at her. "I'm wearing pants, Darcy."

"Why do boys have nipples if they can't feed babies?" Suzette asked. "And do men call theirs breasts too?"

Clint looked at her, grinning some. "You little smartass. What happened?"

"I tripped and fell. The ground was too hard, I should've bounced. Hawaii's supposed to be like a water bed, right?"

"Sorry, the island's solid stone from the volcanos, it's the water around it," Xander said, then finished his first cookie. "Bucky got very peeved that I was sexy dancing with a guy at the club."

Clint looked at him again. "I'd be very upset if that guy got here. Darcy, where did you meet him?"

"Coffee shop. That was the last guy I went out with and I came home pouting because I nearly ripped his hand off."

"Okay." Natasha came out damp from her shower, taking the sheets to read. She growled. "He's tried to date both Xander and Darcy."

"Should he come back, there won't be another attempt at dating." She looked at Xander. "Has no one staged an intervention on your dating life?"

"I only date people who like me, Natasha. They're the ones who like me."

Bucky nodded. "No nice girls ever hit on him. I've seen them totally seem like he wasn't there."

"No, she was a one night stand and horrible at it," Xander said. "I don't think I want that again. Especially since she was into using drugs and I'm not."

Natasha shook her head, looking at Clint. "You're not that bad at least." He grinned back. She huffed but went to find him through the various agencies and online sources she had access to. No one needed that in their lives. Clint winked at Darcy and followed to help.

Steve looked his little girl. "On guys, they're called pecs before you can ask Tony." She grinned and ate another cookie then drank some of her milk.

"Some males actually end up nursing, but it's real rare and it's usually because there's orphans that no one else is taking care of. It's been in the news a few times," Xander told her. "Including a male dog that was nursing abandoned kittens."

"Aww," Suzette said with a smile. "That's sweet. Can you do that?"

"Don't give Willow ideas," he said dryly, smirking at her. "I think it'd drive everyone nuts if I got pregnant."

"No, you shouldn't do that. Only girls should and if Miss Willow does that to you I'll help Daddy kick her butt," Suzette said, looking at Darcy.

"I'll help too. We'll all help, kiddo." Suzette finished her milk and last cookie, leveraging herself up and grabbing her crutches so she could go to the bathroom. Xander frowned a bit. Darcy waved a hand. "She's cleaning up, not doing it for teenagers with eating disorder problems."

"Okay, good. That would suck a lot." Natasha walked behind them to the elevator, Clint right behind her pulling on his shooting glove. "Guys, if you take him out, I want his house in Carpathia please," he quipped.

Natasha sighed. "I'll see what his will says," she complained. They got onto the elevator, Clint smirking at her. "What?" she demanded.

"It goes well with his fortress in the mountains he inherited."

She stared at him then shook her head. "I don't need to know."

"You know, you're pretty deadly yourself," he teased.

"Yes but I like men of wealth and taste."

"He has some money he inherited from Anya."

She shook her head. "No thank you. He's too tough for me. I like mine sweeter." Clint nodded, still smirking. "Nor am I going to tumble him into bed to find out how good he is. I've heard it's ruined a few assassins over the years."

"Quite possibly." They got off and headed for an SUV so they could go handle this problem in their city before it spread and the guy tried to date Bucky. Steve would be paranoid about that and no one wanted to see Steve angry so soon after getting his daughter back.

Upstairs, Suzette was looking at her favorite aunt. "How do you meet boyfriends? The bigger girls were talking about that stuff and couldn't figure out why they didn't meet good boys."

"They go out looking like a ho," Xander said. "So they attract guys who like girls who look like hos. You won't have that problem because your daddy won't allow that. The same as I don't when I'm there."

"That's one point," Darcy said. "Usually you meet them when you're out doing things, though sometimes you can meet people online. So if you go out to the club or you're in a college class, you can meet them that way. I don't know how to meet *nice* boys because they're not the sort I draw," she admitted. "I know my mom met my father when he peed out a window. He was at a party and kinda drunk so he peed out the window and got my mom. She stormed up to yell at him and decided he was cute. But they weren't in good love, it ended after a few years of him being a dick. You definitely need better than that."

Suzette grimaced. "Eww!"

"Yup," Darcy agreed.

"Why would he pee out a window!"

"Because college guys are like that," Darcy admitted. "I'm guessing the sink was in use and the bathroom was too grody to use because the guys hadn't cleaned it in weeks."

Suzette was still making gross faces when she looked at Xander. "I didn't go to college. I went to work and ended up working construction." He smiled. "Not everyone goes to college. Some get bad jobs until they find something they like to do or they go to vo-tech sort of schools to learn a trade. Most of them only party in the clubs and you never want to pick up a drunk guy."

She nodded. "That's a great idea," Steve said as he came out of the bathroom. He looked at Darcy. "She didn't hit him?"

"Oh, she did. He thought it was adorable how spunky my mother was." She grimaced. "That explains a lot about why my parents got divorced."

Steve nodded and patted her on the shoulder. "Your mother deserved better." Darcy grinned. "Some guys also join the military instead of going to college," he told his daughter. "Usually they're pretty decent guys. We'll teach you how to date when you're old enough." She nodded. He looked at Xander. "Did she need to know about the clothes issue?"

"Yup. Because a few girls were trying to talk her and Larissa into joining them in the short skirt guild." Bucky nodded quickly at that. "We had to stop that."

Bucky nodded again. "I threatened to spank because even flappers dancing in cages in speakeasies wore more than they did."

Steve shuddered. "Club hunting?" he guessed.

"In many ways," Xander said dryly. "Also known as lack of common sense since they couldn't hide a weapon. One could almost hide one in her stripper boots but otherwise, not even a bodice dagger could be hidden. They get it from Buffy."

Steve nodded. "We can help her find practical clothes to wear on patrol."

"I can dress like the lady in the movie we watched on tv," Suzette quipped with a smile.

Steve looked at her. "You just want her motorcycle."

"Well, yeah," she said with a grin. "I need one so we can go riding together, Daddy."

"We'll see," Bucky said. "You have to be at least sixteen to get a license to drive a car." She pouted but nodded. "Once you're big enough to see over the steering wheel and reach the petals at the same time, we'll see if Happy can teach you how to drive."

She smiled. "That'd be great. Thank you, Uncle Bucky." She looked at Xander, who was shaking his head. "You can't?"

"No. I tried and I have not enough patience."

"Oh. Okay. I can have you teach me other stuff."

Xander smirked. "I teach many lessons to the girls. Including threatening boys for them."

"Some of them need it," Bucky quipped with a grimace. "You let that greasy walking pile of hair take that one girl out on a date?"

Xander looked up at him. "Your hair's just as long." Steve burst out laughing. "And his was product and too much body spray. He was nervous. I get that. He passed the intent wards, he opened the car door for her, which is something a lot of guys won't do. Many too many just pull up and let the girl hop in." Bucky shook his head with a groan. "One even pulled up and *honked* for her to come out." Steve shuddered. Darcy winced. "I wasn't there then but Buffy went and did the mom job *very* well by telling him how trifling and lacking respect that was. So yeah, the nervous kid was okay enough as far as I know."

He texted that slayer, getting a bad answer back. "He got gropey later and she had to knock him into next week so Faith had to go get her from the jail. Hmm. Well, yeah, they worked that out without me. He apologized for thinking he had manners. She sent back a longer one saying that he did but his older brother had told him to expect 'paid back' for dinner. He sent one to correct that thought. She grinned back and said she was going to the mall, she needed new sneakers. Xander put his phone up. "She's okay. His older brother said he should expect to be paid back," he told Darcy.

She nodded. "I've had a few of those. Is she in real trouble for it?"

"The first one almost was but I was there and I politely told the cop that if the girls didn't smack someone around for disrespecting their bodies and choices, I'd sure as hell do it for the girls. That girls who protect themselves and others are good. And if they tried to get them for self defense I'd let the case go cold when the boy got eaten. So unless they have a *good* reason to arrest one of the girls for something like a bar brawl, which does happen sometimes, then no. Nothing to do with the duty and nothing to do with self defense.

"Especially after Buffy and Faith were supposedly caught by accident talking to the girls on the front lawn about how to defend yourselves against boys who groped. It was their self defense lesson of the day." He smiled. "The lurking reporters got it all and other women agreed until the female prosecutor agreed that she wasn't going to prosecute anyone for saving themselves from being molested. Including the little witch who stopped her grandmother from kidnaping her by blowing up her car's engine and creating a huge mess that created an auto accident. She was seven or eight at the time."

"Way to go, kid," Darcy agreed. "But bad on the accident."

"She didn't realize that sending parts flying all over the street was going to cause other cars problems." He shrugged. "Willow sat down and talked to her about the spell for the prosecutor and they agreed it was a good thing, the insurance companies had to pay because it was an accident during the commission of a crime, and Willow gave her lessons on how to disable a car and how to change things so they weren't going to work. So now she turns wheels into balloons."

"Yeah, you can't drive that way," Bucky agreed. "Who did she do that to? I saw that the other day."

"Grandma." He looked up at Bucky. "Her whole reason for the attempted grab was 'you're raising her to be a heathen with those *gifts* of hers' and she'd do it better."

"Uh-huh," Steve said. "Probably not." Xander smiled at him. "She okay?"

"She and her baby brother, who she taught how to do the stuff Willow taught her, are both okay and they take lessons with the senior witches around the house."

"Aww," Darcy said. "It's good that you see boys doing it."

Xander nodded. "You do, but a lot of them are given funny looks. Especially by the community. There's a real bias about boys doing simple nature magic and girls doing any magic higher than simple nature magic. Girls doing higher magic usually gets them accused of going evil. Boys doing simple nature magic are usually considered faulty somehow because they don't want to do the more powerful stuff that can kill you. The witches are working on that."

Darcy nodded. "A lot of public outreach."

"We had a PR person until she decided she'd rather have her vampired husband and not do the soul spell because he was more exciting this way and it cured the stuff that she was going to divorce him for." He shook his head. "We really do need to hire people that we can trust."

"Your life really is a soap opera," Darcy quipped.

"Many days," Xander said with a grin. "Which is why their plan will never work. No one else could put up with the insanity I have to deal with." His phone rang. He read the message. "No you can't marry the asshole until I've threatened him! Dumbass." Darcy burst out laughing. He looked the guy up and sent her the first thing that popped up. Vehicular manslaughter for drunk driving not even two years earlier. He was on probation. She huffed but he said he could keep looking, he had only done the google search so far. She groaned and said 'no' and left it there. So he called.

"You need to talk to Belinda before she marries the guy who killed two people in a drunk driving crash. She just asked for my permission and I said no then looked him up." He listened. "Yeah, him. Oh, nice, upper crust family. That's probably why he's not in jail. I started with google, Buffy." She did that and sighed, reading what was on there. "Do I need to search better?" He grinned. "I'll be right there." He sighed and waved and disappeared before anyone could stop him.

He glared at the guy, who shrank back. "We only want *good* people for the girls. Not ones that look like their little bottle of rophies is leaking in their pants pocket." He looked and winced, pulling out the small bottle. And the small packet of drugs. "Go. Now. Just....run." The guy stomped off. He looked at Belinda and sighed. "I thought some of my dates were dangerous." She slumped, grimacing. "Can't you use the google?"

"Yes," she muttered.

"Then next time, try that before you get too involved? And you've only known him for *six* days! It's not love, Belinda. That's hit it in the motel length of relationship, not have his future spawn." He looked at Buffy, who nodded for him to go. He hugged her. "The next one will be better because you'll know how to spot them across the club now." He walked off to talk to Andrew, who smiled at him. "Thanks," he muttered, taking the coffee.

"Welcome." He stared at him. "You need to redo all the protections and a few others." He handed over that set of runes. "All but one of what you'll need. I tried to make it pretty but the one on the back needs to go lower on your body."

Xander looked it over then down his shirt. "I probably should get them tattooed on instead of just painted on." He took them to do that and add that set to his usual amount of painting. The new lower one went on his front left hip. He had another rune on his right front hip so it'd match. He looked them over, nodding. The two on his back he let Andrew repaint on. Then Andrew got artistic and painted some pretty vines down his spine to cover one huge scar. "Thanks, 'Drew."

"Welcome, Xander. Have fun finding a tattoo shop."

Xander sighed as he called Maria Hill. "I need a recommendation of someone who can tattoo on my protections. One of the new ones needs to be set in blood. I know that, that's why I'm asking *you*, Hill." He listened. "That'll work. Thanks." He hung up and called McGarrett. "Got any good tattoo shop recommendations? Have to be exact because they're protection runes. Including ones to filter my blood. That'll work. Thanks, man." He hung up and went to the house out there then to their office by cab. Thankfully he had his wallet on him.

Danny looked at him. "He got called up to be nagged by the boss. How extensive are they?" Xander took off his shirt and lowered his pants waistband. "Ow. That's gonna hurt."

"Yeah, a lot. One's on the instep of my foot." He put back on his shirt. Steve walked in and looked down the back of it, wincing. "The large vine was Andrew's idea to cover up a huge scar."

"You could keep painting them."

"The ones to filter my blood have to be set in blood. It's sympathetic."

"I know a guy. He does a lot of SEALs' work." He took Xander there, letting the guy do a full view of all the ones that needed to be inked on. It was going to be a good few hundred bucks for all the work and Xander made sure he could dispose of anything bloody immediately. The guy looked at McGarret. "He was in Africa and caught dengue."

"Ah! Yeah, I can do that," he agreed. "Nothing contagious?"

"Not directly unless you're cooking it down," Xander admitted.

"Even better reason, dude. Yeah, I can do that." Xander got to show him how to draw a few because they were particular that way. He started with the easiest and most important first. They were all on his chest. Xander sighed and started his pain meditation, the one he used for post-battle clean ups. McGarret had to leave to go bust someone but he could handle this on his own. Even if he did yelp a lot at some of them. At least a few could remain just painted on. Those he might have to lose some day and it was easier not to have them tattooed. The one in his hairline was a bit of a pain but the guy plucked a few hairs so he didn't have to shave him totally. By the time he was done it was midnight and the guy told Xander how to treat them. Xander nodded, letting him put bandages over them and he paid the guy plus a good tip, then he got a cab home. He was broke for the week but it was better this way.

The guy, a native sorcerer, smiled at the silly guy's back. He had heard who he was and yeah, he needed all those protection marks. He'd have to look them up, see if any of his usual clients could use them.

***

Kate showed up at the house in Hawaii by sneaking. Her father was still livid but she was escorting her therapist, Sam Wilson, there. Her father liked him when they had met, and he conveniently worked with soldiers so she knew about the battle stuff for his needs, but he knew what Kate really did so she was clear to actually talk to him about stuff. She found Xander on the couch covered in smaller bandages. "What did you do this time!" she demanded.

"Protection tattoos. Can you please gel the ones on my back for me, Kate?"

"Yeah, sure. About time." She and Sam gelled them all for him and recovered them. Xander sighed because the itching quit. She grinned. "I'm hiding."

"I do much of that. I've got to go to see Avena in a few days."

"You're insane," Sam said. "That many at once?"

"Might as well get them all done at once," he said dryly. "That way I don't have to worry about anything but them being cut into. Andrew even suggested something to hide the huge scar down my back."

"I can see that," Sam said. He took pictures and sent it to Bucky. He got back one asking what he had taken on. So Sam told him. "Bucky said he thought only sailors got tattoos but protections that were more firm were good ideas in your case so you didn't get too many more bad dates."

"I didn't put on the one against women," he said dryly. Kate giggled. He grinned at her. "Why are you hiding?"

"Dad."

"Ah." He nodded. "That's cool. What's up, Sam?" He made himself sit up.

"Came to see if you were okay after all that was done with finally."

"Yeah, it's all back to situation normal."

"Not the girls or the Council. You." He stared at him.

Xander shrugged. "I'm okay."

"The last time you and I talked you were so burnt out it wasn't funny."

"Is this like group therapy?" he joked.

"Yup." He smirked. "Not like I can't run a group for heros who need to talk about stuff."

"I guess," Kate sighed. She flopped next to Xander, giving him a hug. "I need to do protections."

"You're not old enough," he said. "Try henna."

"I have two I henna on every four weeks. Dad was wondering why until I told him one was against chaos sorcerers, like my almost last boyfriend, and the other was to protect me against someone like Loki's mind gifts."

"Probably not fully strong enough," Xander warned.

"I know but it'll help."

"Cool. You might think about one against witches casting disease charms." She held up her pendant chain. "Even better, yeah. The new combo one?"

"Yup," she said with a smile. "Because I have some trifling hos in my school."

Sam laughed. "How bad are they?"

"So far they're still trying to turn me into a centaur," she said dryly, smiling at him. "Not succeeding very well but trying awfully hard. I can just imagine the fit if they manage it."

"Well, at least you'll still be able to wear a shirt," Xander said. "We'd try to get you turned back by torturing the ho witches. I'm sure Willow could explain why it was wrong and give them other ideas. That would give Clint enough time to get there if I couldn't."

She nodded. "My dad would still freak and think about shoes. It'd be impossible to find something cute."

"Or for you to climb buildings," Sam added.

"True, but I could definitely pass gym for running," she quipped back.

"We can probably get you out of gym since you do take after school martial arts," Xander said.

"I quit last month," she sighed. "Dad agreed it was a great idea but the sensei got told what I was doing and he's anti-Council."

"There's still some people like that. We like to invite them to save themselves." Sam stared at him. "What? I'm not going to save their asses if they don't want me to."

"Point," Sam said. "It's not a choice. You can't pick and choose who you save."

"Don't remind me." He stared at him.

"You could use a vacation. You're both burnt out," Sam said.

"Yup," Xander agreed. "I'll take a few days when I'm off checking on the minis in a few months."

"I've got four guys who want to help. Yes, they're former military. They *really* want to help. They know that you guys are paranoid about people coming in to monitor and change things, all that. I warned them well about that."

"I can interview them. I told Phil I'd interview two of his."

"They got found to be HYDRA and still wanted to help," Kate quipped. "He asked and they said they really wanted to help the slayers make sure the world didn't end." Xander shook his head. "That's what Phil said too." She leaned on his arm. "I could use a long vacation but it's coming up on the holidays. So probably not."

"Shit, I forgot," Xander muttered. "I'll have to shop."

"Gift. Cards," Kate said dryly.

"Probably for the girls I don't know too well. Most of them get little things from me and a small box of decent chocolates." She grinned. "Yes, you get the bigger version because you're still a girl."

"Thank you. I adore those chocolates you get me." He laughed. "Not like I get a stocking full of candy anymore."

"That means shopping," Sam said with a smile. Xander and Kate both shuddered. "Haven't you been picking stuff up during your travels?"

"Yup and I have to pick one of them up." He sent a message to that slayer and she said she already had them and she'd send them to him later. She was meeting her future husband. Xander stared at the phone. "You're fifteen." He pointed that out. And her calling if it was going to matter. She sent back her mother had told him and he'd be invited to the wedding and she had agreed because he wasn't *too* bad, and if he was mean to her he knew she'd have him eaten. Xander grinned and congratulated her then sent Buffy an email about that. She sent a sigh back. "Sorry, one of the lower African slayers is fifteen and meeting her future husband today to make final arrangements."

Sam shook his head. "I feel sorry for the girl but I know that's how it goes over there."

Xander nodded. "He knows about her duty and she's already promised if he's mean to her she's going to have him eaten."

"Which is mean, but spousal abusers of any type deserve it," Kate said. She looked up. "Dawn said Phil had an idea of asking the higher powers to give the visions to death row inmates instead of you or anyone else. That way they had some use while they were waiting on their appeals to run out."

"I'll gladly share mine," he said dryly.

Sam cleared his throat. "There's a worry that yours will do you like they did Cordelia," he said.

Xander shook his head. "Hers got passed on from Doyle, who was the mouthpiece for the PTB. I'm pretty sure they don't send me the visions. If they did, I would've already died of them. I don't know who does, because they have shit timing. I've had two during sex. Not exactly why I want to groan during that." Kate blushed but swatted him on the arm. "Seriously!" He smirked at her. "Some day you'll find that out and I'll be there to threaten him for you too. Or her, could be a her. Never rule anything out," he said at her odd look.

"As far as I know, I think I'm gonna like the D, Xander."

"It is fun." She swatted him again but sighed and shook her head. "It is. I find it fun." He winced and rubbed over a bandage. Sam handed over the gel so Kate could put more on that one. "Thanks."

"Welcome," she quipped. "Better to have eternal protection against witches so they can't pull you back after you die."

"I need to get Andrew to look those up," he said, blinking hard. He sent that text message. Willow sent back a shriek but oh well. Kate texted Willow to calm her down. They didn't mean *her*. They meant some witch in the future who was panicking about a huge battle and calls Xander back to help.

Sam shook his head, but he was smiling. "Usually I'd say no cellphones during talking."

"That'd be when the evil would attack because we're both out of contact," Kate said dryly. Xander nodded. She smiled at Sam. "We're onto their sneaky plans."

"I'm sure you are," Sam agreed.

Xander and Kate both looked up at the laughing and the voice that said 'they had better plans than that'. Xander grinned. "Hey, Mirash, if that's the plan to take out Kasmira, that's already been stopped, dude. Sorry."

The demon appeared. "What?" he demanded. Xander showed him the vision he had already countered. Then he got up to get his log of visions to show him all the ones he had countered. "I don't know which source gives your visions but we need to end them. Though that does mean that all my competitor's plans are ended so I can enact my own." Xander winced, holding his head. "Fuck!" He disappeared. Kate got Xander sitting down and helped debrief him from the vision. Sam too, he had seen a few of these. Kate could even make the headache tea for him.

***

Somewhere far away, a male smirked. "That's good, my little promised one. Very well played," he cooed. "Not like we'd let all the powerful chaos sources go to one chaos god. That wouldn't be fair or balancing."

***

Two days later, Kate and Sam carried Xander into Avengers tower, nodding at the receptionist who was giving them a funny look. "Special delivery," Kate quipped. She looked at the elevator. "JARVIS?" she called plaintively. The doors opened and they went up to the living room area. She and Sam put Xander onto Bucky's lap, handed Stark the vision log, complete through that morning, and Bucky the gel for the tattoos. Then they smiled and walked off together to get coffee. "Have you tried that new shop up the street? It's gourmet or something. Not sure if it's better than the little espresso shop by my school but anything's better than Starbucks."

"Bring you guys back anything you'll pay us back for?" Sam quipped before they got onto the elevator.

Tony looked at the log, frowning. "His past visions." He flipped to the end ones. "At least six in the last day."

Bucky shifted, putting the bottle down so he could open Xander's good eye to look at it. "He's fully out. Looks sedated."

Bruce came over to help Bucky move Xander onto his own seat. Xander moaned and started to have another one until Bucky touched him. "I think they're moving with their plan," Bruce complained. Tony was texting Kate, who said it was any contact that blocked it. The Devon Coven were paying him back.

"Any human contact stops them," he said. "Why does he have tattoo gel?"

"Because he's got a bunch of bandages," Bruce said. "Probably why." He helped Xander shift so he was laying on Bucky's thigh, which stopped them from coming. "I'm wondering if his ex's are going to storm Devon."

"I can," Bucky said. His phone rang. The message from Ethan Rayne was odd so he forwarded it to Andrew to interpret. He didn't speak magic. He got back specific instructions from Andrew with 'I'll bring the potion and then go blow the fuck out of them for him'. Bucky answered a 'thank you' to them both to stay polite. He had nothing against Ethan Rayne yet. It was nice of him to help Xander.

Stark was reading through the vision logs, shaking his head every few. "Let's hope he doesn't have to have hardly any after this run. He's had sixteen recorded in the last four days." Bucky winced, checking Xander's neck pulse. Xander weakly swatted at him before trying to rub over a bandage. Bruce took the gel to do them for him, staring at how many bandages got uncovered. "Looks like all the protections he had done." They all looked healthy so Bruce just gelled them and smiled when Xander shifted to take the gel and do the ones on his hips without fully waking up. "Want me to do any on your legs or back?" Bruce asked quietly. Xander pointed at one of his feet and then his lower back, then groaned as he shifted. Bruce got all the ones on his back and found the one on his foot, wincing at how much that had to have hurt.

Bucky shook his head. "I knew he had some in henna. I don't know many people who have that many tattoos. Steve came off the elevator from the gym. "They dropped him off to go get coffee. Apparently the witches in Devon are getting back at him by making him have run-on visions if he's not in physical contact with someone."

"That's bad," Steve said, tipping his head to look at the marks. "Protections and stuff?" Bruce nodded. "I guess that's good."

Andrew appeared, handing Bucky the potion. "It'll work for about three hours at a time. It's a sip now and then sort." He looked at Xander. "That's going to suck. The one against bitches might keep away some of his ex's." He disappeared. A few minutes later, a special news report came on the tv about a giant robot stomping on a few houses in Devon, England, and they had no idea what the witches had done to piss off others this time.

"Hopefully the potion's not a permanent fixture," Bucky said, giving Xander a sip of it. Xander spluttered but glared at him. "Andrew made it to help you. That way you won't have as many visions for three hours."

"Going to kill them," he mumbled. Bucky pointed at the tv. Xander snorted then looked up. "Unless you want them to make sure there's no way any plans come into being, I'd go help Andrew with that one thing I found in Cyprus." On the tv, two large stone statues appeared and they joined arms to dance on top of the ruins of the houses. "Thanks, guys."

"Can you use that to cancel a poker debt?" a gravely voice called.

Xander grinned. "No, sweetie, I have *plans* for yours. Chaos god sized *plans*. But I'll cancel one of Sorba's so you can get it from him instead." The demon was shivering as he appeared and hugged him then left. Xander sat up, looking at his new marks. "Thanks for the help, guys. I can't reach all the ones on my back."

"What's with the flowering belladonna vine?" Bruce asked.

"Andrew suggested it to cover up a nasty scar." He grinned. "That one hurt the least of all of them. I'm so glad I didn't need a dick tattoo to solidify the protections. I used to paint one on when I was with Anya so she'd have to leave me alone if she had caught something when she cheated with Spike."

"You kept her after she cheated?" Stark asked.

"I didn't get dates back then, Stark. No one was interested and Anya was trying new human things that she hadn't gotten too do in her years as a demon. I told her if she did it again she was history. That was her only warning and my hand didn't require presents or wear me out. She never did it again that I knew of."

"You needed male role models back then," Steve said. He walked toward his room.

"Nothing else there in town that wanted to date me," he said dryly. "Plenty that would've eaten me but not dated me. Or cuddled. I didn't find many of them until I went to LA with everyone after the battle. That night's stress relief was nice enough to comfort my loss and nearly killed Buffy for complaining I had left her alone to have some quiet time."

Bruce cleared his throat. "We can help you put down things to get college credits for life experience," he offered.

"College isn't for guys like me, Bruce. And even then I'd go into something like archeology since I have this little gift of falling into holes that let me find things. Like altars to dead realms or mystical artifacts, or buried treasure last time." Bucky groaned. "Steve and Danny made that same sound," he said with a grin. "I was off with Sonya to have a picnic and fell into a water spout hole. She wasn't real happy that our picnic with sex was interrupted for them to come rescue me and what I found down there, but she did like playing with it after they were gone. The mermaid colony had been gathering pearls and shiny things they found on the ocean floor. Including a genie bottle I did not touch. We handed that sucker over as a dangerous mystical artifact."

"Are they demonic?" Bruce asked.

"Trapped and ensorcelled humans. It's like getting a wish demon job only it sucks more and you're never around people who don't want stuff. If you're not freed right it can kill you too. One of the ones I play poker with is one and he's a horrible card cheat but he's pretty lonely most of the time. He's still stuck but his last owner got sent into a coma while his bottle was open so he could go out and talk to people if he wanted. He said he really wanted to be an incubus but got tricked into this job. Still better than the probable future of being castrated as a queen's guard though."

Bruce nodded. "You know some really weird people." Xander smiled. Bruce handed over the gel and walked off to go to his lab to find something that didn't make him think for a while.

Tony watched Bruce walk off then looked at Xander. "You do that better than Lewis does."

"Did you know one of your ex-bimbos is actually a wish demon?" Xander asked him. "She swayed up to me drunkenly the other day and told me to tell you she said hi and she missed your fingers. She's over doctors who need miracles or something like that. Pretty blonde lady." Stark groaned and got up to walk off shaking his head. He grinned at Bucky.

"I don't have any living ex's. I didn't do more than date." Pepper came off the elevator. "Morning, Pepper."

"Boys. Which one, Xander?" He pulled up the picture on his phone, showing it to her. "Oh, that bimbo. I remember her. She at least picked up after herself and was happily pleasant the next morning about it just being for fun." She sighed. "He had so many I had to ask."

"I'd keep picture of mine to make sure I remember but that might implicate someone," Xander quipped. He grinned at Bucky. "I found a very nice lady who liked my new tattoos. Sam even liked her when they chatted because we were all at the bar before the first vision hit. She helped and it didn't scare her off."

"I'll do a background check on her," Bucky said, cracking Pepper up. "That way we know which bad girl field she's in."

"She's a chaos mage. Vowed to Loki." Bucky stared at him. Xander nodded. "She didn't like his invasion plan either." He grinned at Pepper. "She's young, just a few years older than I am. She's hip. She suggested a few marks I could add to my collection of protection runes. She's a really sweet lady and was real honest about some day wanting daughters. I warned her mine would probably be tortured by the PTB but she knew how to get around that by blessing them to someone immediately. She even said the mermaid taint was cool."

"She was probably looking for a baby daddy," Pepper said.

Xander smiled. "I told her it wasn't going to be today. A man needed practice for things like that and if they were mine I'd be there helping a lot. She said that was always the best way to do it unless you wanted cranky and mean chaos sorcerers in training. She said she could even figure out how to put most of the hellmouth taint into one of them so they'd be sure to have magic so they could follow her. I told her I'd consider it after our fifth date. She cooed and that's when the damn vision hit. I'm hoping Sam got her number."

Bucky texted that and nodded once. "Kate approved of her because she was honest and only a bit mean, not evil. Damn." Steve came out from showering and changing clothes. "Xander met a nice chaos mage sworn to Loki who hated Loki's invasion thing. She wants kids too."

Steve just nodded. "Would the others like that, Xander?"

"She and Buffy could be better friends, she likes shopping and Willow doesn't. She's willing to help the girls. I might have to make sure Andrew doesn't steal her from me but the slayers won't mind. They might start planning a wedding almost immediately but otherwise it'd be okay with them as long as she was helping them. They mostly were with the others. The most I get is some anti-gay stuff but that's mostly solved by the other girls beating the snot out of them for it."

"If you're that interested in chaos people, why don't you talk to Ethan?" Bucky suggested.

"Because he's Giles' ex-boyfriend and way too old for me."

"Fine." He grimaced, considering things.

Xander stood up. "The last time I knew I was doing the laundry so let me get back to that."

"Potion only lasts for three hours," Bucky said, holding it up.

"Tony said you'd been trapped in the visions for a few days," Pepper said.

"Then I hope someone put the wash into the dryer." He frowned. Andrew reappeared and shoved him back onto Bucky's lap. "What's wrong now?"

"They're trying to get Willow to agree with them." Xander snorted. "They're saying you were overly mean."

"I was about to be chopped into parts!" Xander complained.

"They say that your heirs would continue your work and the Powers said it was a fitting end. They could stop whoever made the bombs."

"Sure, after millions might die," Bucky said. "No. Hell no."

"To quote a few of the minis, super hell no," Xander said quietly, staring at Andrew. Andrew started to carefully move away from him, looking scared. "They're doing this so the slayer is fully back as their little soldier and I'm not going to allow it. I will call injury on them in the higher courts and I will call in every single poker debt." A demon appeared, nearly drooling, looking expectant. Xander smiled and shook his hand. "You don't owe me one."

"No but I'm willing to give you one for free. That coven is going to make sure humanity falls. They're all blinded and expect the next single slayer called will fix it all. She'll be four but she's expected to fix it all."

"I can do a curse of true sight," Andrew offered.

"Which means they'll see what they want to see wherever they're looking," Xander reminded him. "They can get around that." Xander considered it. "Andrew, can you do a genealogy spell?"

"Of course." He got some paper thanks to Pepper and did it. He looked. "Why do all the witches die off in three generations?"

"Because the sort that'd set the bombs aren't going to like them," Xander said bluntly. "Do a few of the people around them? And Willow's?"

"She's on here. She's got a daughter that dies at about six-years-old. A lot of people die at that time." He took it back there and put it on the table. "Xander had me do a genealogy spell." Willow snorted. "Your daughter and a lot of other witches are going to die when she's six." She snatched it to look at, staring at all the death dates. No one survived. She moaned. The others stared at it. "Xander reminded you that the people who'd create those bombs, they don't like witches or slayers. Apparently in the next twenty-three years, there's going to be at least two major apocalypses.

"Thanks, now I have to speed up work on making sure I can be transferred to a cybernetic body." The witches were checking on things. They saw the Powers trying to block it and moved around it. They all screamed and cursed the Powers for making them start that off. "Apparently you're just weak pawns to them too?" he quipped. "That's something Xander's known all along. He's got beings begging to help him."

"I remove my curse," Willow said, canceling her part out. Hers was the heft behind it. The others glared but she glared back. "Not like he'll be here to protect us. He'll be dead before then of a vision." They all groaned and canceled the curse.

Andrew pulled Xander there. Xander stared at them. "First, don't start none won't be none." They groaned. "Second, I'll be *damned* if you try to force a *child* to be a warrior! How fucking evil are you!" They flinched back. "Third, I know what I'm going to ask that nice wish granting demon who just offered to help here. The Higher Powers need some more female influence." The wish demon appeared. "You all need to refind your goddess. So let's let Inana take up a six generation position with the Powers That Be, and she'll be able to hand it over to whoever she likes when that time is done with."

The demon moaned like he had just orgasmed. "You sure you want her, Harris? She's militant."

"She's over amazons on her world," he said with a smile. "Some day she wants to go back and take them back over. How better to get her used to a lot of warriors working together, male and female, than to be watching over the warriors we have here who are like her own?" He smiled. "Besides, the other goddesses trapped on this plane aren't usually nice and I only know of one who would be protective of the slayers. She's a nature goddess. She can work with Inana if you want."

The demon moaned and nodded. "Oh, Sweet God, yes," he sighed. He made the wish go through.

Inana appeared, kissing Xander gently. "Thank you, my love. No special favors though."

He smiled. "I know you'll treat the slayers and hunters like warriors, not tools or pawns in a game."

"Yes, I will. I know how important warriors are to a group surviving." She smiled and took another kiss. "I'll see you sometime, sweetie." She ran a hand over his head. "Only the important visions and they won't hurt as much." She took one last kiss, then looked at Rosenburg. "Butt out of his life, witchy." She smiled at him. "I like that pretty chaos mage, Xander. She's sweet. Though the standing idea is very hot." She disappeared, taking that demon with her to announce her and her best friend, the nature goddess. The world could use more prettiness as well.

Xander smiled. "Two great new light side goddesses you can pray to too."

"Your ex was pretty," Willow said quietly. "Kinda. Do noses run in her people?"

"Some people have larger noses, Willow. They also know how to keep them out of things." He disappeared with Andrew. He sat down with a sigh of pleasure, looking at Kate and Sam, who were staring at him. "Sorry, had to go fix some things."

"I'm scared to ask how you did that," Kate said.

He grinned. "Someone showed up to grant me a wish so I wouldn't have to use poker debts. So I gave Inana a way to learn how to work with multiple warrior personalities beyond her amazons." Kate swallowed hard. He smiled. "She's now one of the Powers That Be."

She laughed, sounding nervous. "You're joking, right?" Sam asked. Xander smiled and shook his head.

Andrew shook his head but slid down next to him. "She's a great choice. She knows how to battle to save people. She understands what warrior women can and should be. She knows that the slayers aren't all that happy to be slayers and how we work around them because she and Xander have had on-and-off things for years now." He looked at Xander. "I'm sorry you lost your snuggly bunny."

"It's okay. I would've lost her to going home anyway."

Andrew smiled and nodded. "Probably. What about the pretty chaos mage she mentioned?"

"She's pretty nice. I think I'm going to ask her out."

Andrew patted him on the arm. "As long as she's good to the girls we won't mind. I'll check with Giles too."

"You can stay, Andrew," Sam said. "We're basically having a talk group about hero stuff."

Andrew gave him an odd look. "I'm not a hero, Sam. I'm the housemother. I cook and clean and make robots."

"Which you run during battles so that makes you a part-time hero, the same as I am," Kate said with a smile.

Andrew pouted. "How am I going to take over the world if I'm a hero?"

"It'll be a great betrayal but they like you more than me," Xander said dryly. Andrew hugged him and left. "Don't make Andrew panic, Sam. He and his buddies made a lot of taking over the world plans." He stood up to stretch. "Since I've already done group therapy once this week with Kate, let me go find that pretty chaos mage I want to flirt with." Steve hauled him back down. "Hey!"

"I think we can all go over things, that way we can work together during huge demon battles the next time," Steve said with a smile.

"Fine. I'll call Ms. Beldane later." She appeared, smirking at him. "Hi, I was going to come find you."

"You called for me, that's like summoning me." She winked and slid into his lap, kissing him. He moaned and picked her up, walking her off to the elevators. She laughed and made them go back to her place up the street. He was definitely worth the magic and the energy. He even nicely fought off the bad thing that he accidentally released by walking past it. Then he made her pray to her god and all the others.

Back in the tower, Bucky just sighed and shook his head. "It'll be days. He's like that." Dawn appeared and flopped down, giving him a hug. "I don't hug, Dawn."

"Shut up, before you become a yappy dog," she muttered, squeezing him harder.

He elbowed her to get her off him. "What happened?"

"My sister just gave me the 'see, this is what happens when we try to go to a normal life, demons intrude' speech. Again. So I had a screaming match with her. I got yelled at for defending myself but that's about usual around Buffy."

"If being a normal woman makes you happy, then be a normal woman until you're forced out of the closet as a witch," Sam said. "You can't live your life for your sister."

"I know. I've tried. I've even changed my phone number. She has Willow get it for her. Maybe I'll find a school in another reality to get away from her nagging me like I'm a toddler. Oh, and get this, she threatened one of the guys I was helping study for being a guy in my dorm room with the door open. Apparently I'm not allowed to have sex, ever, because it's evil because she has bad taste." She looked around. "I was going to pout at Xander."

"He met a pretty nice chaos mage," Kate said. "She came to pounce. Inana's now a PTB." Dawn stared at her, mouth open. Kate nodded. "Xander made the wish."

"Well, fuck, but hey, amazons will come back into style again." She pulled back her hair and let it go. "Sam, can I please have you go thump my sister with some reality like you did me when I was trying to decide what I wanted to do for real?"

"I can do that," he agreed with a smile. "I've talked to many of the slayers. The same as I do these guys."

"Sorry, guys, didn't mean to interrupt therapy stuff." She stood up and disappeared. "Buffy, get the hell out of my room before I go out clubbing looking like one of your whore patrol of slayers on the prowl and pick up *all* the bar," they heard. Then they heard a door slam. The feed cut off.

Sam shook his head, sipping his coffee. "Dawn's really a good kid. Has a good head on her shoulders. Has ideas of what'll make her happy. Wants to pay her own way in life and give back to people most of the time. I think her mom would be really proud of her. I still have no idea why they're making her take chemistry though. Her either."

"She said she was transferring to Georgetown," Kate said. "I suggested Columbia but they didn't have her exact major and she didn't want to be in the whirl of the strange stuff up here." She leaned back. "I really like Dawn. She's the lightest of all of us heirs of Xander." Bucky gave her a dirty look. "He redid his will. He left Dawn stuff to make an exhibit on the Council and on Anya. I think his wishes said for her kids to do it. Because by then it'll be historical."

Bucky shook his head with a sigh. "Sometimes he's incredibly weird and worrying."

"But that's what makes him a Xander," Sam said. Bucky nodded that was true. "Anyone else want to talk about stuff that's been going on?" No one said anything. "Fine. Just remember you can talk to me when you're all burned out and ready to fire on the normal humans." Stark smirked. "Yes, I know you've been there for years, Stark. Humor me and call first?"

"I guess I can do that. Does anyone pay you to do this for me?"

"Harris does out of the Council fund. I'm one of their on-call therapists for the girls who are going critical. It's only interfered one time and I had her come to sit in with my group. The vets all understood where she was sitting and how bad it got from there so they talked her down off her pointy edge while helping themselves." He smiled. "It's the benefit of group therapy."

"We usually mumble around Darcy's pies," Clint said. "She bakes really good."

Sam smiled. "She's womanly that way. A lot aren't these days." Everyone nodded.

"I didn't realize Xander could really cook until he sent Andrew on a few days leave," Bucky said. "He was tense after we all got back from hiding and Xander took over housemom duties. He did a really nice job. Andrew was surprised too because he came back expecting smoke damage or something."

"I didn't know he could cook," Sam said.

"He said he had jobs that he cooked during. Including at a strip club."

Sam nodded. "That makes some sense. They're cheap and easy jobs. Somewhere like Sunnydale would shed workers in those faster because most guys in those jobs are teens or single people. Doesn't he cook when you two travel?"

"Some. He doesn't make anything fancy but it tastes good." He looked at Steve. "I did that recipe Dernier used to make when we made a good camp. He really liked it." Steve grinned back. He looked at Sam again. "He hasn't told me. Who's going where?"

"He said he's going to do his mini hellion check in a few weeks," Sam said. "You going?" He sipped his coffee.

"I don't know," Bucky admitted. "I might take over part of his route so he doesn't have as much to do. I don't mind traveling and it might help with those last few things we're tracking down."

"What few things?" Clint asked.

"The same project that made Suzette made three boys, two of which are still living the last we heard," Sam said. "They're in some sort of specialized training center."

Clint winced. "Damn."

"Basically," Steve agreed. "We think one's Suzette's brother." He looked at his buddy, who nodded he'd tell him. "Thanks, Bucky."

"Welcome. Not like I want to leave little kids in their hands. Who knows how they'll screw them up or if they'll end up like that one poor guy we heard had tentacles."

"Do I want to know?" Stark asked the ceiling then looked at him. "Why would they do that?"

"Because they could," Bucky said. "Last we heard about him, he was put back into cryo because he wasn't able to integrate right." Stark shuddered. "So we don't know. We're looking at the mop up of all that."

"If you want help, let me know," Steve ordered. "Not like I want that sort of being to have kids either." Bucky smirked at him. He smirked right back. "It'll be like old times."

"Definitely." He snapped his fingers then reached over to hit him on the back of the head. "Because I heard about the grenade in basic, dumbass. That and I owe you one for jumping without a parachute." He hit him again.

"Ow!" he complained. "It was a silent drop!"

"So?"

"It was into water."

"Again, so? Did the serum take out all common sense?"

"Did yours?" he shot back.

"No, I think it was freezer burn," Bucky shot back. Steve huffed but sat back, frowning now. "Sam, you need to encourage him to find the sense his mother passed on to him. Before he has to have this same talk with his daughter, who'll say stuff like 'but you did it, Daddy'."

Sam grinned. "We've already had a talk about some of those things." He grinned at Steve. "The next time you pull something boneheaded but heroic, think about what your daughter's going to say."

"I will."

"Thank you."

"Thanks," Bucky agreed, smiling at him. "We'd appreciate not burying you as well."

"Shut up."

"No!" He stared at him. Steve glared back. He arched an eyebrow and Steve huffed again but relaxed and wasn't going to stomp off. "If you die, I'm going to summon you back so Xander can be possessed by you."

Steve leaned forward to look down at him around Natasha. "No you won't."

"Yes I will. It'll be like having a more wild version of you around." Steve groaned. "It'll help Suzette too." Steve moaned and shook his head. "Then I'll teach her every single dirty trick I taught you and all the new ones I've learned too."

"I always try really hard to come home to her, and to call you to make sure you're okay and you know I made it home."

Bucky stared at him. "You're turning into Xander."

"Maybe he's turning into me," he quipped back, trying to smile. Bucky stared at him. "He could be. I'm a role model I'm told."

"He's not patriotic."

"Point. I'm trying."

"Thank you. That'd be a nice change."

Steve sighed. "I'll try harder."

"Great," Natasha said, getting up and moving. "You two can do the hugging thing since this is officially therapy now." She went into the kitchen, coming out with some more coffee for Clint and tea for herself. She sat down on the arm of the chair Clint was perched in. "Did I miss the hug?"

"No," Sam said. "They're being too macho to hug."

Cordelia appeared, smiling at Bucky. "They've presently got Inana tied up so their latest plan can go on. Sorry. She's about to go after them with a sword but we can't stop that storm." She disappeared. She was cheering Inana on. The goddess had her sword and she was going to kill them like they were bugs. Even Whistler had gotten out of the way.

"Storm?" Bucky called. "Care to elaborate?" No answer. He called Xander's phone. "Cordelia said some sort of higher up made a storm to push their idea," he said into the voicemail. "Let me know what you hear." He hung up and called another number. "Boris, Barnes. What storm?" He listened, wincing. "That's going to suck huge to quote Xander. Thanks." He hung up. "Bad hurricane this year." Steve was already sending that message on by the time he had finished. He also texted Darcy.

She came off the elevator and looked up. "If I fuck them will you quit trying to end humanity?" she called. "I'll take one for the team and treasure the experience probably, if they're any good at it, but I'm not settling down and I'm not really wanting to be a mom right now."

Whistler appeared, straightening out his hat. "It won't stop the storm, it was already coming. They just upped the power. They wanted you four mated so you could control the chaos."

"I bring plenty," she said with a smirk. "I'm told I should've taken up chaos magic by some."

Whistler nodded. "Yes, you should have. But apparently you have things that can put a leash on Harris."

"They're called boobs," Darcy said. "Most women have at least some."

Whistler blushed. "Not something I know anything about. The Powers That Be don't need me to know."

"Beyond that, Xander's just found a cute chaos mage he really likes," Bucky said. Whistler whined and shook his head. "And if they make the storm worse than it's supposed to be, I'm going to find a way up there."

"Inana's already taken a sword to them," Whistler complained. "Harris ruined them by making that wish."

"Hmm, ruining a higher power to protect a bunch of people called humanity," Darcy said. "Hmm...." She tapped her lip with her finger. "No, I think I would've done the same and given her the grand pooba crown too." She stared at him. "Not like they're hitting on me. If it takes me getting naked time with happies at the end to keep them from killing everyone, I'll do that but I expect to be rewarded because Xander's not really my type. He's a bit too wild."

"He needs a leash," Whistler said.

"No, Xander needs a mate," Bucky said firmly. "Someone who can help him with what he's chosen to do. Someone to be there on the bad nights after the horrible battles to soothe the nightmares. We could *all* use that. Short of us hooking up together, it's not going to happen and Xander's not her type anyway since all his are dangerous or deadly. Darcy's very womanly but she's not that sort of dame."

Whistler slumped. "It's not my call. I'm sorry."

"Well, stop the storm and I'll let them get closer to my boobs," Darcy said sarcastically. "But if one extra person gets hurt, you'd better believe I'll start praying to a chaos god named Xander."

Whistler shuddered. "I'll point that out. Maybe they just didn't look." He disappeared.

"Again?" Darcy quipped. "How shocking would that be?" She stared at the two heros. "If we have to do it, I expect takeout." She walked off. "I'm not usually that easy but if it'll save lives, I'll do the deed and have happy thoughts for a few nights at the prettiness." She went back to the lab to complain to Jane and Thor. Maybe Thor could find them and beat them for her.

"Wow," Stark said. He looked at Sam.

"I've heard a lot about them not paying any attention. Xander got visions for the longest time about slayers being in a battle that was coming up but the slayers they demanded be there had died out decades ago. He finally had Willow summon Cordelia so he could point out that they had died. He had to sigh and tell them that and apparently they punished him for telling him they were morons who didn't look." Sam shrugged. "We have great higher ups over the ones who protect humanity."

"Can we send Loki to help them be higher ups?" Stark asked. "He's nutty and warped and evil but I think they'd make better minions and the slayers would probably get around him anyway. It'd be like being a king in name only." He drank the rest of his coffee and got up to get some more, making another pot when he heard Jane stomping up the stairs complaining. He handed her a cup of coffee on his way past her. "Not our idea, Jane." He flopped back down.

"What can we do to stop them?" Jane demanded, sipping her coffee and moaning. "That's nice. Thank you, Tony."

"Welcome." He sipped his own. "No clue. They're the powers over the slayers and other people who save us all from demon things."

"Maybe we can wish all the demons go to another realm and the slayers are reduced to just in case something else invades," she said, grimacing.

"DON'T YOU DARE MAKE THAT WISH! WE DON'T NEED TO PUNISH ANOTHER REALM AND IT'LL KILL EVERYONE HERE!" Cordelia shouted, appearing to glare at her. "We'd all like the slayers rescued and saved from the duty, but that'll kill humanity. So no, we can't do that and don't even think about it. Some would grant it so they had new realms to go take over. By the time they'd get here to take us out for it, we'd already be dead." She disappeared. "Forget you ever made that wish or wish it on another realm."

"She's got a very strong voice," Jane said, blinking hard.

"She used to be a cheerleader," Bucky said. "Used to date Xander too."

Jane just nodded. "Sure." She walked off. "Thor, I'm sorry if someone or something heard my wish and grants it. I'm told it'll end humanity. You might have to come visit me in Loki's old cell." He hugged her, and let her tell him what she had said. He agreed it would probably kill everyone and that other realm as well so he'd help make sure it wouldn't happen here.

"Anyone else wondering if there's a chaos god getting high?" Clint asked. Everyone nodded. "I wonder which one it is."

"Janus seems to be really liked," Stark said. He finished his current cup of coffee and put it aside. "How do we stop that?"

"Hopefully it's self-stopping since we can't unless we ascend into higher beings," Natasha said. "That's not a title I've ever wanted." She threw a knife at the squeaky sound she could hear, killing the mouse. "Stark, you really must do something about her experiments."

"She's not here any more." He got up to look, holding up the dead mouse. "Nice shot but it's a New York rat." He went to toss it off the balcony once the knife was out of it. "I'll have someone come up to put down stuff to kill them." He handed the knife back on his way back to his seat.

"I've already told Miss Potts, sir," JARVIS said. "She's set up an appointment for four this afternoon and they'll finish baiting the tower tomorrow. Everyone is given the rest of today and tomorrow off because of the spotting of the rat."

"Thanks, JARVIS," Clint said. He looked at Natasha, who smirked a tiny little smirk. He looked at the others. "We got asked to a Halloween charity ball, people. Do we have to go?"

"I'm still officially Council and we do not celebrate that holiday," Bucky said firmly. "Vampires take the night off, so do most demons, but chaos sorcerers seem to think it's their playground. No thank you."

"Because of one incident?" Stark asked. "Done years ago? It's for Make A Wish, Barnes. For sick little kids."

Bucky stared at him. "Last year, we had to take down the sorcerer who was making living zombies for a huge party of monsters." Stark slumped, shaking his head. "Thankfully they reverted as soon as he was unconscious. So did the fake werewolves before all but one got skinned by a pelt hunter. That one was mid-skinning and they arrested him because Xander nearly killed him for it." Everyone shook their heads. "We don't celebrate Halloween. The kids go on candy stroll in harmless, light sided non-costumes. A crown, a cape, something like that without being anything specific. I'll gladly donate."

Xander came back alone, looking sweaty and tired. He flopped down beside Bucky pouting. "Her god told her I'm not the one he was expecting. He had seen another me in another realm, and her sometimes with me, and thought we'd be a great high priest couple but then he realized I'm more chaotic than he wanted so she's not allowed to date me or use me to have the future high priestesses she wanted."

"Is that because the higher beings over you were about to up a hurricane so it was worse? That way you'd all screw?" Stark asked.

"Stark!" Sam complained.

Xander looked at him. "That's unusually nice for them. Why do they want me to have sex instead of destroying me this time?" Everyone stared at him. "The PTB *loathe* me, guys. They're against me dying in any manner that might make anyone remember me fondly. Why do they want me to get happy?" He tipped his head back. "Do I have to summon?" he called. Cordelia appeared, nodding, then disappeared. He sighed and got up to get chalk, putting down marks on the porch with it. He looked up. Then stepped into the circle. Whistler appeared, already wincing. "They wanted me to have sex why?"

"Because the slayers are following you and turning too wild."

"Most of them are living in wild areas. That's the natural life there."

"You know how they are," he complained then flinched when lightening went off.

"That's probably Thor."

"He's mythical, kid."

"He's the really tall blond guy who helped with the invasion, Whistler. Guy with the hammer? That's Thor. He's here in the building. The stuff Anya did to me makes me really sensitive when one's around. That's how I knew Loki was really not pleased I wasn't like that other me. Is it a bad thing when a chaos god thinks you're too chaosy?"

"Probably. Can't you calm down?"

"I haven't done anything wacky and wild in months." He pointed at the bandages. "Protection marks. That way I don't have to henna them on again."

"Oh." He sighed. "I'll try."

"I'm not screwing to stop a hurricane. They'll still kill people and they'll still blame us even if we were screwing when it started. Humanity's like that." He grinned. "But I can wish another higher power join. I'm kinda mad at Loki for interrupting my fun." Whistler went pale and shook his head slowly. Xander smirked. "You sure?" He nodded. "Fine. If she wanted me, she'd hit on me. She hasn't even flirted with me so I'm pretty sure I'm not her type. Beyond that, having a mate, a true mate, means they'd be beside me doing all the weird things. I'd just get cuddles afterward."

Whistler slumped. "I can point that out but they're going to hate it."

"Bring me with you then."

"I can't do that. You're corporeal."

"I can meditate. I did get taught by shaman." He walked out of the circle and sat down, dropping pretty easily into that state. Then he went on a dream walk, smirking at Whistler. Whistler moaned but brought him up there. Xander walked over to something and smashed the crystal ball. "You're looking in the wrong realm again," he said slowly and clearly when they stared at him. "Dumbasses. I had another vision with a slayer who died over a century ago and everyone riding deer. We're not elves or dwarves, we drive cars." They all glared. Inana put down freezing spells so they couldn't stop him.

Xander walked over to something and broke all the other balls too. "Clearly, you guys were smoking the bad drugs when you made them so redo them." He smashed one last one and then found the switch behind it, switching it back to 'on'. "There, that should help." They all stared as the lights came up and things started to show the right realm and the right people. "See? If you had looked, you could've stopped stuff."

"Unless you want to die of an STD, shut up," one of them sneered.

Xander smirked. "Disease charm due to Anya, sweetie. Because you guys wanted her to be a ho around me." He smiled. "Though I'm a bit upset that Loki decided I'm a bit too chaosy and not like the one he had seen in that other realm that had dated his high priestess. I could've settled down with her. Had a *true* mate. Because, you guys forgot the hyena." He grinned. "Matriarchs don't share." He waved a hand. "Hurricanes aren't romantic and we'd be blamed even if we were screwing when it started. Humanity is full of assholes who hate us for saving them. I'm not going to put myself into that, even if I'm fantastic in bed and Darcy would soar for weeks from my tongue. The girl deserves someone more her type than I am since she didn't even flirt with me. Remember, only dangerous ones like me."

"Your next one might try to kill you," Cordelia warned.

Xander looked at her and shrugged. "How is that different?" She slumped. He grinned. "I finally figured out where that came from when we were cleaning out all the stuff left in the 'Dale. I found the little stairwell to the shrine I accidentally fell into when I was a kid. It's to some chaos god I can't recognize. I'm guessing since it felt like home, he did it." She slumped, staring at him. He grinned. "I was like four. Jesse and I were playing hide and seek and I remember spotting a door I hadn't seen so tried it because it might go to a basement." She moaned and turned to kick a wall. "Right underneath that defunct demon clinic too."

"Stop. Please?" she begged. She went to look and came back. "It is a chaos god and not a native one." She looked at Inana. "I think it's from your realm."

She read Cordelia's memories. "Next one over. Sweet." She kissed Xander and smiled. "You're being naughty and worrying people."

"Bucky's seen me go dream walking before."

"Hmm." She stroked his cheek, reading his mind. "That's slightly evil, love. Where did you find that?"

"Which that?" She showed him. "Oh! When we were walking on the beach and I had to rescue that turtle demon? That's the portal he was stuck in." She moaned. He grinned. "Apparently I'm like a magnet for that."

"Yes, you are." She kissed him. "Go back to your body and we'll rescind the 'you must mate' order." He smirked and disappeared after one last kiss. She sighed, sitting down with her sword against her arm. "That man is too damn good at that."

"I didn't get to find out. We never went that far," Cordelia complained. "Buffy was right, Angel wasn't bad but I've seen Xander's lovers beg. Why?"

"Tongue. Things," Inana said with a smile. She shared the memories with the poor, deprived girl. Cordelia moaned and shivered as she got off. That broke most of the chains binding her to the PTB. She smirked. "Maybe you can find out some day. Go tell the boy to go over his storage area with Bucky so they can find whichever radiating artifact he has mis-stored." She went to do that. Whistler got healed by her. "They're sorry they're petty and idiots. Go rest, Whistler." He bowed and left them to talk. She looked at the hissing quartet of higher beings. "Now that we're sure we're on the right realm, what are we looking at first? The upcoming apocalypse battles or the current slayers so you actually realize who's presently alive and called?"

They stomped off. She did those readings and made notes then plans. Those ones, they didn't need to plan things and she could easily take over since they hadn't turned their seats off. She sat in each one to consolidate it with her own, then moved her seat to the high seat and sat down, making changes. The slayers didn't need that much work and a few of the most troublesome demons could go home.

***

Xander woke up and got up to stretch, wincing some as the new tattoos pulled. "Better. Maybe now we'll have less crackhead moments." He looked inside, noticing it was dark, so he disappeared. He was free! He could go have fun in a club while looking like a dork who couldn't dance. Like normal when he was out to have fun and not hunt. He ran into the same chaos mage and shrugged when she glared at him. "I'm just here to get down. Didn't know you'd be here." He went out onto the floor anyway. It was her pouty thing. No god or goddess had ever told him to get off a lover. Maybe that's why he didn't pray to one.

Locasta Beldane sighed in displeasure. She still wanted that man but her god had sworn he'd abandon her if she went there again. She knew a little bit of fantastic sex wasn't worth it, but Xander as a whole was the mate she wanted and needed to center her. A new man walked in and she sneered at the little chaos punk. He walked over to her and kissed her hand. "No. Not even if he himself said so. You're not worthy and you're not strong enough."

He sulked but went to get a drink at the bar. She sent up a nasty prayer to her god because she didn't need some young pup to raise up. That one was barely out of his teenage years. She was better than that and he was a weakling. He'd never be a good partner, she'd have to do all the work and they'd be off-center during dual castings. She heard Xander yelp and smirked some. Someone must have hit one of the new tattoos. He came back and flopped down across from her with his drink, pouting. "I can't have you."

"I'm not here about that. I'm getting away from the three succuba who want to rip the new protections open." He sipped his drink, a regular soda. "I think it'd be really rude of me to behead them in here."

"Probably," she agreed, staring at him. "He sent someone." She flicked a finger at the guy.

Xander looked and snorted, then smirked and waved at him. "Hi." The guy's eyes went wide and he shook his head then fled the club and hopefully the reality. "The douchebag?"

"Yeah." She sighed. "I need a man like you that he'll like."

"Not really any other guys like me, Loki."

"Locasta. I hate being compared to her."

He smirked. "You're just as strong as he is."

"Not really."

"Have you seen him? You're physically and mentally stronger. Stark said he's more broken than not."

"That's sad." She pouted. "But he's my god and I gave myself to him."

Xander nodded. "Well, maybe you're his anti-psych drug then." She smiled at him for that compliment. "We can still be friends, Locasta. I'm into friends with my ex's. I'm friends with most of them, outside a few one-night stands that were me being desperate."

"We can do that," she agreed. "Why come here?"

"First club I saw."

"Oh. We are right down from your house."

He nodded. "You can tell him you know you're the one on this realm because on that realm, Hawaii had protections. The you there couldn't get back onto the island. Also, scrying over there, they now have dragons and shit." She stiffened. He nodded. "Someone created a bad thing that created more magical infusion."

"Oh, shit. I know what spell they used."

"Just don't here. I'll have to help clean it up. Though, if you did it in New York, I'm sure they'd like the herd of unicorns and stuff." She burst out laughing, swatting him on the arm. "Hey!" He grinned at her. "Some of the witches in Kate's school are still trying to turn her into a centaur."

"She'd make a pretty filly but that'd give her more excuse to kick them too." She grinned. "So naughty. Thank you, Xander." She banished the succuba as she kissed him on the cheek. "Go get happy that you're not being protected."

"I like him. He's a buddy."

"He is but you're still alone."

"Yes I am," he said with a wicked grin. "No one to complain about how I dance." He got up and went out there to go back to letting it all go again.

She got up and went home, much happier now. She could be friends with Xander without sleeping with him. Though now she knew why Inana had went to sleep for a week by the reports out by her former home. She checked on her and found the 'ascended' message, moaning in pleasure. Such chaos and her true mate had done it. She was so proud of him.

***

Bucky made sure he had everything he'd need to help Xander sort out his demented storage area. Including stuff to cover any artifacts they found and to note what they were. He looked up. "Xander?" he called. No answer for a few minutes. He was about to call again when a disheveled and sweaty Xander showed up doing up his pants, his t-shirt between his teeth. Bucky blinked. "Go take a shower. You smell like a whorehouse."

Xander blinked at him. "Sorority chicks. They thought they'd cure the gay." He smirked a tiny bit. "I told them it didn't work that way. They wanted to become maenads." He pulled on his t-shirt. "I'm good and now awake. What's up?"

"Whistler popped by to tell me to help you clean up your storage area. Something's leaking. Go shower." He pointed.

"I'm good. I'll be getting sweaty and dusty anyway. It's just sweat since I'm a faithful condom user." He felt someone behind him and nodded at Steve. "I got summoned."

"From what? A nest of succuba?"

"No, Locasta banished them from the club when they tried to ruin the new protections."

"Shower, Xander," Steve said. "It's disrespectful."

"He usually only calls for really bad things. I was expecting a huge demon he didn't recognize, not a call to go do physical labor." Bucky gave him a shove in the direction of the bathroom. "Let me go home for a few to get clean clothes too." He sighed but did that. Then back there as soon as he was dressed. "The witches are frantic that I clean that out. They ganged up on me to send me back faster. Didn't even let me have coffee. Thankfully I think I sent the old camping stuff there." He took Bucky's hand and Bucky's bag of stuff in one hand. "Okay already." They disappeared.

Bucky looked at the small warehouse of stuff. Mostly boxed stuff. He sighed in displeasure. "Where's the probable area of artifacts?" Xander shrugged. "How do you put stuff in here?"

"I send it through the little box thing I carry with me." He pointed at the end. "Then Andrew charmed an imp to move it for me. Mr. Impy Imp?" he called. It appeared, looking miserable. "I haven't been traveling. He got told to find a leaking artifact and where did you put the holiday presents?"

The imp led them to each of them. Xander sorted out a bunch of stuff for presents. Bucky's little necklace to detect magic, a birthday present from Andrew, lit up on a few of them when he came over Xander took those out of the sorting piles. "You need an inventory," Bucky complained. "Three things were leaking."

"Sorry?"

"No, they were broken."

"Oops." He shrugged then grimaced. "There's worse out there. I really should try to tame the rug again."

"Give it to Natasha. She could like it." Xander looked at him. "She might. It's protective."

"It is." He gathered up the box of presents and walked that way. The storage cube full of artifacts made Bucky's pendant light up so brightly he covered it so he could see around the glow. Xander had to climb up to get the rug folded, which made it fall. Once it was suitably folded he put it onto the box too. Then he poked around in there, looking for something specific. That went under the rug into the box. "Thanks, Mr. Impy Imp. We'll be back sometime. Good work."

"Can you do an inventory?" Bucky asked. It nodded and pointed at the clipboard on the wall. "Thanks. Some higher beings wanted to know what was in here." The imp grimaced but shrugged. "Can you send me a copy of that?" The imp nodded. "Thank you."

Xander took them back to the Council house. His box got put aside. "Presents," he warned. The witches and Andrew quit snooping. Bucky's box of broken artifacts got looked at and fixed. In one case resealed because it was leaking like a broken hellmouth in a pretty jewelry box. "I found that in the desert," Xander said. "It was where my truck got stuck because the tire blew."

Andrew looked at him. "That's a really weird and dangerous gift, Xander. Can't you give it back?"

"No. But I did find out where I got it from." He grinned. "There's a shrine under the defunct demon clinic. I remember hiding there when I was four." Andrew moaned, turning to gently thump his head against the fridge. "It was a great hiding spot. Still felt like home during the clean out."

Bucky looked at him. "Don't make me knock you out. Even though you do smell like succuba again."

Xander sniffed himself then looked at Bucky. "Are you sure it's me?"

"I don't touch them except to let them wear out magical surges that've been sent at me."

Xander sniffed himself again. "Maybe the succuba did something last night." Andrew came over to drag Xander to the working room so he could demagic him again. Two curses and a blessing later and he was better. He nearly fell into the magically hidden room of mystical weapons that no one had been able to find for six months but he was better. "Maybe it removed Anya's thing that kept Asgardian things from me?" he suggested when a dagger floated out to follow him.

"Maybe," Andrew agreed. He couldn't grab the dagger, his hand passed through it. "Let's get you nearer to Thor." He took him and Bucky, giving him a visual order to fix Xander again before disappearing. He went to make himself some coffee and go sit in Xander's treehouse. He had such a headache.

Xander looked at Thor. "My ex Anyanka put a protection on me so I wouldn't screw up her specially blessed necklace she wore to the prom. We think Andrew just removed it by accident."

Thor grabbed the dagger, nodding. "Perhaps." He looked at his hammer, who was quivering. Xander stepped away. "Can we ask her how she did it?"

"If you want to go into the hellmouth to talk to her shade."

"Not particularly. I'll see if anyone might know of it," Thor said.

Cordelia appeared, handing over a scroll. "Don't go see Sarabetta for a while. Okay? She's near a mystical artifact and you might set it off." She disappeared.

"Not my fault," Xander complained. "It's probably a punishment for staying friends with Locasta."

"Probably not," she said. "That was the turning you into an incubus curse. Thankfully that's ended too."

Thor shook his head, looking at the spell. "I do not do magic." Andrew showed up to do that one. The hammer quit getting wobbly about Xander and the dagger went limp in Thor's hand. "Thank thee, Andrew."

"Welcome, Thor. He has this strange gift to fall into weird things." He handed over the box he had grabbed. Then he disappeared.

Xander looked at the rug, looking at Bucky. "We'll have to set it to her." He went to find Natasha. He started to unfold it when Bucky walked her back into the living room. "In the center." She stood in the center and he unfolded the last few corners. It wiggled and moved, making her change her stance. Then it went limp and one edge rubbed against her leg. "It likes you." He looked at Thor, shrugging. "I'm about to go check on all the minis. After I set up presents." He disappeared to his house.

Natasha looked at the rug. "It's very finely woven. Just a few snags that can be smoothed over." The rug rubbed her again. "Thank you, rug." She got off it and rolled it up with Clint's help to take to her room. It would look wonderful in her living room. It nearly moaned once it was in place and the coffee table was back in place. "Too much weight?" It rubbed her frantically and went quiet again. "I take it you like it. Good. You look nice in here." She looked at Clint, who was grinning at her. "It seems to be as smart as you are." He bopped her on the arm but walked off grinning. Natasha clipped a few threads that were sticking up but the rug looked much better. "There, more handsome." No sound. "Did I break you?" It patted her. "That's fine." She sat down to read for a bit. The rug liked that, shifting closer to her. So apparently she had a pet rug now. It was an interesting present the boys had given her.


TBC....
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