Together they walked down one of Sunnydale's back alleys in search of their prey. Xander's nerves were on edge as the demon they hunted had some seriously powerful mojo at its disposal. For the twentieth time in as many minutes, Xander wished that Willow and Tara could have taken the time to teach him a few spells for protection. The heavy weight of the flail in his hands provided a small measure of comfort. But only a small measure.
Buffy's attention was totally focused on the shadows ahead. Shadows that potentially held danger.
Xander, for his part, was too busy looking everywhere else for danger to notice Buffy's intense forward focus. In his experience, evil generally sneaked up behind you.
This time he was right.
Out of the shadows behind them, a tall demon emerged and pointed a staff at them. Instinctively Xander leapt into Buffy to try to get her out of the line of fire. A ball of green light shot out of the staff and their world went black.
The first thing Xander noticed was the smell. It wasn't pretty.
Opening one eye, Xander found himself laying in a pile of garbage in an alley.
Looking up her saw a clear blue sky.
"I've had it with getting hit by demon bolts and waking up in big piles of garbage!" Xander grumbled. Sitting up he saw that Buffy was laying beside him. Gently he shook her.
"Come on Buff, time to wake up and smell the garbage." Buffy took a few moments to stir and then sat up. Looking around she wasn't happy.
"Remind me to kill that demon really hard next time I see him." She took another look around at the unfamiliar surroundings.
"Where are we?" she asked Xander. He looked at her strangely.
"In a big pile of garbage. Other than that, I've no idea." He got up and helped Buffy up. Brushing themselves off, they walked toward the end of they alley.
As they got to the end they got the feeling that something was amiss. The buildings across the road weren't any they had ever seen in Sunnydale. They had a decidedly retro look about them. Buffy looked to her left and saw a car that made Giles' old one look like a Lexus.
Xander's startled scream snapped Buffy out of her car day dream. She looked where Xander was pointing at in fear and horror. It took her a few moments to see what he was pointing at. Buffy gasped in fear and horror.
On an official looking building on the far corner, hung a flag.
The flag of Nazi Germany.
Xander was power freaking. He was beginning to attract stares from the few people on the street. Buffy dragged him back into the alley way they had arrived. She had to calm him down so they could work on getting back from where ever the hell they were. She gently grabbed hold of his shoulders and shook him.
"Xander, calm down. It's OK. Please listen to me." she said to little effect.
Xander was in his own little world of fear. Buffy had to think of why he was so freaked and how she could calm him down enough to try to get home. Then she remembered the time when everyone's nightmares came true back in high school.
Xander: Oh, the spiders! Willow's been kind of, um, what's the word I'm looking for? Insane about what happened yesterday.
Willow: I don't like spiders, okay? Their furry bodies, and their sticky webs, and what do they need all those legs for anyway? I'll tell you: for crawling across your face in the middle of the night. Ewww! How do they not ruffle you?
Xander: I'm sorry! I'm unruffled by spiders. Now, if a bunch of Nazis crawled all over my face...
Buffy: Mm, it was pretty intense.
Willow: Thank you.
Xander: Well, the Hellmouth, the centre of mystical convergence, supernatural monsters: been there.
Buffy: Little blase' there, aren't you?
Xander: I'm not worried. If there's something bad out there we'll find, you'll slay, we'll party!
Buffy: Thanks for having confidence in me.
That explained why he was power freaking, being stuck in a world where Nazis rule is one of Xander's worst nightmares. But she needed Xander. She doubted she could get home by herself. Not that she had any intension for leaving Xander here. She needed him to overcome his fear. How could she help Xander find the courage to face their problem?
A memory of their conversation back when Buffy first went to college gave her the answer.
Xander: Buffy, this is all about fear. It's understandable, but you can't let it control you. 'Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to anger.' No wait, hold on. 'Fear leads to hate. Hate leads to the dark side.' Hold on, no, umm, 'First you get the women, then you get the money, then you...' okay, can we forget that?
Buffy: Thanks for the Dadaist pep talk, I feel much more abstract now.
Xander: The point is, you're Buffy.
Buffy: Yeah, maybe in high school I was Buffy.
Xander: And now in college you're Betty Louise?
Buffy: Yeah, I'm Betty Louise Plotnick of East Cupcake, Illinois. Or I might as well be.
Xander: Buffy, I've gone through some fairly dark times in my life, faced some scary things, among them the kitchen at 'The Fabulous Ladies Night Club.' Let me tell you something, when it's dark and I'm all alone and I'm scared or freaked out or whatever, I always think, 'What would Buffy do?' You're my hero. Ok, sometimes when it's dark and I'm all alone I think, 'What is Buffy wearing?'
Buffy: Can that be one of those things you never, ever, tell me about?
Xander: It's a deal. Let's put this bitch in the ground! What do you say?
Buffy: I think I say thank you.
Xander: And nothing says thank you like dollars in the waistband. Ok, what do we do first?
Caressing his cheek gently Buffy looked him directly in his madly darting eyes.
"Xander, I'm here, OK? I need you to calm down. We're going to get through this. I promise. But I need you. I need my Xander."
He calmed down, his eyes met hers. For a moment there was a connection. They could see a deeper feeling between them, something forbidden. The moment passed.
Buffy took a step back from Xander as he rubbed his eyes.
"Thanks Buff." he said. "I was kind of hoping this was just a nightmare, but I guess it's real."
"OK, we're agreed that it's real. But the question is where are we? Are we in some kind of alternate reality? Or have we travelled back through time?" Buffy asked.
"If that demon sent us to an alternate world then all I can say is why couldn't he have sent us to the world without shrimp?" He implored the heavens. Buffy couldn't help but laugh. Xander looked at her and smiled. Where ever he was, he was OK. He had Buffy with him.
"Come on Buff, let's go and find out where we are so we can get home."
They went out onto the street again to try and get an idea of exactly where they were. Buffy looked around but there was little to go on.
"I'm pretty sure we're in France." Xander said from behind her.
"How can you tell?" Buffy said as she looked the other way.
"With legs like those, we got to be in France." Xander told Buffy as she turned around.
A young woman was riding past on a bicycle and her dress rode high enough to reveal the nicest legs Xander had ever seen. Well, the nicest legs that weren't attached to a certain blond Slayer.
Buffy slapped Xander on his arm.
"God! Xander, you can be such a pig at times!" Xander rubbed the sole spot on his arm then broke into a big grin as he waved to the young woman on the bicycle.
"Bon jour!" Xander called out to her. With a lilting laugh, the young woman replied "Bon jour!" and rode off into the distance. Xander turned to Buffy with a little self satisfied grin.
"See? Told you so." he said. Buffy rolled her eyes. Then a thought hit her.
"Newspaper!" she said and hurried back down the alley they came from. She started to scramble through the garbage they had landed in.
"What are we looking for?" Xander asked.
"This!" Buffy said pulling out a newspaper. She started to scan it, looking for some clue.
"Well? What's it say?" Xander asked her.
"Xander, it's written in French." she told him.
"So? You took French in high school."
"That was back in high school. You took algebra back in high school. How much of that do you remember?" she asked a little sarcastically. Xander shut up.
"I can't really make much sense of it, but they keep talking about some operation called BARBAROSSA." she told Xander. Xander groaned.
"What?" Buffy asked.
"I remember this from high school. BARBAROSSA was the German invasion of Russia. That demon has blasted us back into the middle of World War 2."
After digging around the garbage for a while we came up with a date. October 3, 1941. Now we had a date to go on. A plan started to form in my mind.
"OK Buff, I've got a plan to get us home. We agree that it is October 1941, right?" I asked her. She nodded.
"Well, America and Germany aren't at war yet. Germany declares war after Pearl Harbour, which doesn't happen until December 7, 1941. All we need to do is keep a low profile and find the American embassy and they can send us to England." I explained, a little proud of my idea.
"OK. Huh? England? Why England?" Buffy asked, not quiet getting my idea.
"England, you know, Watcher's Council, big library, spells to get us home." Looking at Buffy I saw the penny had finally dropped. She looked at me impressed.
"How did you come up with that?"
"Easy. (1) Ever since I was a little kid, me and Willow would sit and listen to her mother's stories about Willow's great grandmother who fought the Nazi's during the war, and (2), ever since I got possessed by the soldier back at Halloween, I've been reading and watching old war stories and stuff." I said with a shrug. Buffy smiled at me in a way I would never forget.
"See, I told you I needed my Xander." Buffy said and gave me a hug. I fought down long repressed feelings and the urge to kiss her. When she let go, she looked into my eyes.
"You know, I always thought I knew you. But I've got this feeling that there's a whole unknown side to you I'm yet to see." I panicked a little when she said that. We were rapidly heading into uncharted emotional territory, and I for one didn't want it to end up in disaster. I gave her a goofy smile.
"True, but if you had been there that night at 'The Fabulous Ladies Night Club', you wouldn't be saying that." Buffy rolled her eyes at me.
"Come on Stripper Boy, lets get going." She groaned and together we headed off in search of the American Embassy.
It was a nice day to be out walking, if you didn't think about where they were. Buffy and Xander walked the streets talking about this and that. Xander felt himself falling for Buffy again. Well, he never had stopped having feelings for Buffy. But he had learned to lock them away over the years, knowing that Buffy would never feel that way about him. He'd learned his lesson with Willow.
Something caught his eye up ahead. There, in real life, a black uniformed SS soldier was dragging a young red haired woman out of a building. Before he could even think about it, Xander was charging at the SS soldier, leaving Buffy behind in his wake.
Xander had never been big on football, but the flying tackle he delivered on the SS guy was definitely worthy of Superbowl status. The two struggled to get control of the SS soldiers pistol.
Out of the door came a grey uniformed soldier who, seeing the struggle, started to unsling his rifle. He never had a chance as Buffy's fist slammed into his head, sending the hapless soldier flying into an unmoving heap. A gunshot rang out and a frightened Buffy turned to see Xander rolling off the now dead SS soldier. He looked at the gun in his hand for a moment then removed the spare clips for the pistol from the SS guys belt.
As Xander stood, the red haired woman started pulling him in the direction of a side alley. Buffy started to say something but Xander cut her off sharply.
"Just shut up and follow me!" he yelled as he ran off following the woman down the alley way. They twisted and turned their way through the back streets with the fear of the devil in their hearts. The woman stopped and lifted a manhole cover that lead it's way down the sewers. The three of them entered the sewers where the woman produced a torch. Together they ran a few hundred yards through the maze of tunnels before the woman stopped to rest.
Buffy, puffing from fear rather than exertion, grabbled Xander and slammed him up against the wall.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?!?!" She yelled at him. "We were supposed to keep a low profile remember? Instead you had to be an idiot. You shouldn't have done that!"
Xander's own rage exploded. He shoved Buffy hard into the opposite wall.
"I will not stand by and watch those Nazi bastards kill innocent people! Do you know the stories I was told when I was growing up of what these Nazi bastards did to people, simply because they were Jewish? For the first time in a very long time, I'm glad Willow isn't with me." his eyes burned with anger and intensity.
"You remember Willow? Come on Buff? They would kill her in a second just because of her last name. The fact that she is a Jewish lesbian witch means triple bonus points and a hard-on for Hitler. I'm not standing by not doing anything. America made that mistake too many times. I'm not." With that Xander turned to the woman and gestured to her to continue leading the way.
A little distance behind, a chastised Slayer followed them.
The three walked through the maze of tunnels that was the sewers. To Buffy and Xander who had spent a good deal of time either down sewers or in graveyards, the sewers of Second World War France were little different to the sewers of 21st century Sunnydale. Occasionally their guide would stop, looking at the walls and pipes of a junction for some sign or mark that neither Buffy or Xander could discern.
Rounding a corner, they were surrounded by several men with guns. The woman spoke to them in a language neither could follow. One of the men removed the pistol from where Xander had it tucked into his jeans. That done, they entered a cleverly hidden iron door which they assumed protected the hideout.
The red haired woman spoke to another woman who they assumed to be in charge.
Buffy and Xander sat on a wooden bench and waited. They both were angry at each other, but they were also ashamed of their behaviour towards each other.
They looked at each other, their faces a mix of emotions. Then Xander gave Buffy a small smile and laid a reassuring hand on her shoulder. Buffy returned his gesture with a relieved smile of her own and took Xander's hand in her own, their silent make up complete. A slight cough from the second woman ended the moment.
"Sharon tells me that you saved her from the SS." The dark haired woman said to Xander in a slightly French-Aussie accent.
"Yeah, I guess we did." Xander replied with a slight shrug. He now had a name for the woman he had saved.
"Why?" she asked Xander.
"We saw the SS guy try to take her away. I couldn't stand by and watch, so I had to do something." The dark haired woman nodded.
"But what were you two doing here? I presume you and your girlfriend are both Americans." Buffy and Xander looked at each other and Buffy quickly corrected her.
"Umm... he's not my boyfriend. We're just good friends." Buffy told her. Out of the corner of her eye, Buffy saw Xander deflate a little when she said that. She pondered for a second. Xander didn't have those kinds of feeling for her any more. Did he?
The dark haired woman looked at them sceptically.
"It doesn't matter." she said with a dismissive wave. "The important thing is why were you two out on the street. America isn't at war with Germany, we are."
"We were trying to get to the American Embassy so they could arrange to get us home. But I guess that with half the SS after us, that idea is out the window."
"Indeed it is. The SS major you killed was the younger brother of the SS general in charge of this section of France. He is going to want your heads. And I mean that quite literally." the Resistance leader told them. Buffy rolled her eyes.
"Great, another big evil that wants us dead." she said to Xander. The woman looked at them quizzically. Buffy silently panicked. How was she going to explain her way out of this? Xander came to her rescue.
"We grew up in a pretty tough neighbourhood. A lot of gangsters and stuff. If they thought you had seen too much then, well, I guess you ended up on their 'to do' list, if you know what I mean." One of the Resistance guys laughed.
"Oh, we know exactly what you mean. You are looking at Nancy Wake, the most wanted woman in all of occupied Europe." he said gesturing at the Resistance leader. "The Germans call her 'the White Mouse' because she has been able to get out of every trap they set for her. She has helped over a hundred British airmen escape the Germans and return them to England. So you can imagine that she is high on the Nazi 'to do' list."
Nancy blushed a little at the mention of her deeds.
"I do what I can, nothing more." she said to him. Quickly she regained her focus.
"We can't get you to America, but we can arrange for you to get to England. The American Embassy there can get you home. It's not going to be easy. The Nazi's have been hitting our organisation very hard of late and it may take a little while to get things going again. We can keep you here until the time is right. Marko will show you to your beds. They may not be comfortable, but I imagine that it will be more comfortable than what the Germans had in mind."
They were shown to their temporary home. It was a small alcove off a passageway with no door and two small bunks. A jug of water and a large basin sat on a table in the corner. Not the Ritz, but infinitely better than a SS jail cell. Xander sat down on the bed closest to the entrance.
"You can take the one closest to the wall, Buff." he said. Buffy, exhausted from her day, flopped down on the bed, not bothering to get under the thread bare blankets. In seconds she was in a deep sleep.
Buffy woke with a start. It took a few moments to remember where she was. Looking around she noticed that someone had hung a few blankets up to screen off her part of the alcove, giving her a measure of privacy. She heard the sound of water splashing and peeked out of one of the blankets.
It was Xander, stripped down to his Tickle-Me-Elmo boxers, washing himself out of the basin. Buffy almost giggled at his cute boxers. Watching the water run down his body, Buffy saw the lanky boy she knew in high school had become a man. As she watched the water run down his muscled frame, she wondered why she hadn't noticed his transformation before now. When Xander turned towards her to get his towel, Buffy quickly lay back down.
She felt disgusted with herself, acting like some sick peeping tom on her best friend. But she had to admit that, watching Xander just then, she had felt a tingle of attraction. Buffy lay for a few minutes trying to process this new development. Then Xander called out to her from the other side of the blanket screen.
"Buffy? Are you awake yet?"
"Uh, yeah. I'm up."
"Are you decent?" asked Xander.
*No, I'm a dirty pervert who gets her kicks out of spying on her bestfriend.*
Buffy thought to herself. Aloud to Xander she said "Yeah." Buffy could hear Xander smiling when he replied.
"Oh, OK then, I'll come back when you're not." Rolling her eyes, Buffy sat up and stuck her head out of the screen.
"You are such a pig some times." she said with mock disgust. The one she felt disgust towards was herself.
"So long as I'm like that pig in that movie 'Babe' I can live with that." he replied. Buffy was silent for a moment then looked around at the screen and at Xander.
"What's the what?" she asked gesturing around their little alcove and at Xander.
"The screen? I thought you might want a little privacy so I hung my blankets up. I'm sorry I couldn't do a better job but they haven't got any more blankets to go around." Buffy looked at Xander's bed and saw that he had stripped off the blankets and now only had a thin sheet on the bed.
"Xander! You can't do that! You haven't got any blankets. You'll freeze." she protested. He waved her protest off.
"Buffy, I'll be fine. It's not that cold. Besides, I know that privacy is important to a girl." he said bending over the end of the bed and thus missing Buffy's guilty look. He came up with a pile of clothes and handed them to her.
"Here. I got us a fresh change of clothes and there's water in the basin so you can clean yourself up a bit. I couldn't get any hot water for you, so it might be a little bracing." he said. Standing he untied the rope the blankets hung on and retied it across the entrance to their alcove.
"There. While you're doing that, I'll find out about food. Be warned though, this being France, we're more likely to be having garlic snails than pop tarts." Xander said with a grin and left.
Buffy watched him go. She felt like the biggest bitch in the world and undeserving of such a wonderful guy friend like Xander.
Anya was truly a lucky woman.
Buffy took her time washing herself. As she wiped the grime of the past day away, she thought about Xander. She remembered how she felt when she saw him earlier, and it puzzled her. In all these years she had known him, she had never (love spells gone wrong aside) been physically attracted to Xander.
Sure, there had been times when she had looked at Xander in a less than friend way, most notable was when Xander got on the swim team. At the time, she saw Xander in that red Speedo and noted that he wasn't a hairy man (she hated hairy men) and that he wasn't the ugliest guy ever to wear tiny swimmers. But she wasn't attracted to him then.
But others have been. Ampata the Inca Mummy, Miss French the Prey Mantis, Willow, Cordelia, Kendra, Faith, and Anya had all at one time or another been attracted Xander. Sure, half of them had tried to kill him, but of her two boyfriends to date (she tried very hard to forget Parker), half of them tried to kill her too. Why could they see that Xander was attractive but she could not?
Angel.
She had always looked at the world through Angel shaped glasses. They made Xander look like her Xander shaped friend, rather than the eye candy he actually was.
But those glasses had fallen off somehow, and she was faced with the predicament of lusting over a friend who was already taken. She could sympathise with Willow now.
But could she really?
Willow loved Xander. Big time. She still did, but Willow had realised that that ship had sailed. There would be moments when Willow would give Xander a wistful glance, but their lives had taken a different turn and there was little chance of going back.
Buffy felt lust towards Xander. She accepted that now, although it still spun her a bit. But could lust turn into love? Could she love him? What kind of man was he? The real Xander Harris, not the Angel shaped distortion she had always seen.
Buffy gave a bitter laugh. Xander had fought by her side for years, saved her life, shared moments of joy and grief, hung out with her, and just generally be one of the key figures in her screwed up life, and she didn't know jack squat about him.
Well, she was going to find out.
She found him talking to Nancy in what passed for a kitchen. He was telling her a story about one of his experiences at work. He was quite animated as he got to the dramatic conclusion, and his chocolate eyes sparkled with mischief. Nancy was bent double with laughter.
"All that trouble, and it turns out to be the wrong house!" Nancy exclaimed between fits of laughter. Xander saw Buffy and motioned for her to sit at the table.
"Here you go Buff, breakfast." he said as he placed a plate before her. She looked at it suspiciously.
"What is it?" she asked Xander as he sat across from her.
"Well, look at it this way. If someone said I'd be having breakfast with you in France, I'd be hoping for springtime, and eating croissants in a nice little cafe. Instead, I get wartime, and eating fried spam in a sewer. Real romantic." he said with a roll of his eyes. Buffy's heart gave a little flutter.
"Romantic?" she asked. Xander back peddled a bit.
"In a strictly platonic, just good friends, not wanting to incur the wrath of an 1100 year old former vengeance demon, kind of way." he said trying to extricate himself out of (what he thought was) a hole with Buffy.
Nothing was further from the truth. As Xander stammered and spluttered his way out of a non-existent hole, Buffy looked at his face. Smiling, she tilted her head to the side a little.
"You know, when you're falling to pieces, your mouth does the sweetest thing." she said, not knowing that Willow had said that exact same thing just after Homecoming.
This was too much for Xander who quickly excused himself and left, clearly distressed.
Buffy was left sitting there wondering what had gone wrong so quickly.
Xander wandered the tunnels a bit in search of a quiet spot to sit and think. He flopped down on a tea chest and thought through the previous exchange.
Ever since Buffy arrived at Sunnydale, she had made it clear that she saw Xander as nothing more than friends. But yet for years, Xander held onto the remote impossible possibility that she would wake up and smell the Xander. She never did and this hurt him in ways he could hardly describe. It had affected him and his relationship with Willow. If it weren't for Buffy, who knows what might have happened.
After a seconds thought, he realised he did know. They would have become the Xander/Willow version of Spike/Dru. Except that Willow looked way sexier in tight leather pants and corset. He had a fleeting mental picture of Willow dressed up as VampWillow with a riding crop and evil little smile as she advanced towards Tara.
He shook his head in an effort to rid his mind to the picture. Ever since that First Slayer induced dream with Wills and Tara in the back of the ice cream truck, he would occasionally get mental pictures like that.
With a sigh, he rested his head back on a pipe and thought of Buffy.
He had thought he had gotten over his feelings for Buffy. He thought he had moved on with Anya and Buffy had moved on with Riley. But it wasn't the case.
The cracks in Buffy and Riley's relationship had come to light after Xander's little trip into Twin Land. For the first time ever, Xander was relaxed about Buffy's choice of boyfriend. Riley had seemed to be a great guy who cared deeply about Buffy and who could give Buffy that bit of normality she had always craved.
But Riley couldn't handle the combination of her calling and the shadow of Angel.
After the disaster with Willow and Oz, Xander had resolved never to give relationship advice to his friends ever again. But when Buffy and Riley's relationship imploded, he felt an urge to speak out. Their conversation wasn't pleasant, and had touched more than one raw nerve. Looking back now, he saw that what he said to Buffy wasn't to do with Buffy and Riley. It was all about Buffy and him.
What Buffy had said to him this morning had hurt him? His love for her had never really died and her words filled him with hope for them. False hope. Buffy would never love him while the shadow of Angel fell across him.
He knew who his heart belonged to, but he also knew the harsh reality. Now he had to find out where that left him and Anya.
The next time Buffy saw Xander was later that day in the radio room talking to Nancy and Sharon. Xander and Nancy were discussing the war and the Nazis while Sharon looked on. Looking at Sharon, Buffy saw something that aroused an unexpected feeling. Sharon was checking Xander out.
'Oh no you don't.' Buffy said in her mind to Sharon. 'Not my Xander.'
This pulled Buffy up short. Since when was he her Xander? Possessiveness and jealousy weren't feelings she normally had in regard to Xander. But neither was lust, but she felt it. Buffy wanted what Cordy, Willow, Faith, and Anya all had at one point or another.
A bit of Xander loving.
Xander noticed Buffy out of the corner of his eye.
"Hey Buff." He said a little awkwardly. Buffy decided to pretend everything was fine and act cheerful.
"Hey Xand. How goes the war?" she asked cheerfully.
"Well, the Nazis do what Nazis do. But I'm consoled by the fact they'll get their evil butts kicked in due course." he told her. Nancy expressed a little doubt.
"I'm not so sure about that. Hitler has conquered almost all of Europe and looks all set to knock Russia out of the war. As soon as they've done that then they'll turn on England with full force." Xander gave Nancy a confident smile.
"Trust me on this. The good guys are going to win this war."
Nancy shrugged her shoulders.
"Well, you must excuse me. I need to go do my bit to ensure your confidence is well placed." Nancy said as she and Sharon left the little room. Buffy and Xander looked awkwardly at each other for a minute or two.
"Look, Xander, I'm sorry about earlier...." Buffy started but Xander just waved her off.
"No need to apologise. I'm not a morning person and I shouldn't have snapped at you like that. I'm a bad Xander." Buffy grabbed his hand and reassured him.
"We're cool Xander. Water under the bridge and all that."
Buffy held onto his hand, relishing the feeling of physical contact. Reluctantly she let go.
"So. What are we going to do with our time?" Buffy asked. Xander said nothing but produced a deck of cards with a little flourish.
"Cool. What do you want to play Xand?" asked Buffy. Xander had a mischievous glint in his eye.
"How about strip poker?" he asked. Buffy rolled her eyes a little.
"Xander, every time you get a deck of cards you ask me that question. What would you do if I said yes?" Xander thought for a moment.
"Cheat."
The next few days saw Buffy and Xander get into a routine of playing cards and listening to the radio. The tension between them was gone and they used the opportunity to get to know each other better. They had become the closest of friends. They told stories about their lives and revealed secrets that they had never told anyone before.
Buffy wept at the story of Xander's childhood. The abuse; physical, mental and sexual. Buffy could see why he and Willow were so close. Willow had literally been the one good thing in his life for so long. Willow knew of his parents physical and mental abuse. But until now, he had told no one about the sexual abuse. Xander's haunted look when he told her would forever remain etched in her mind.
Now, as the two of them sat and listened to the gentle music of the radio, Buffy could hardly believe someone who had gone through the nightmare of Xander's childhood could turn out to be so loving, so brave, so sane as he was. Standing, Buffy held out her hand to Xander.
"Dance with me."
The two of them held each other close. They moved slowly to the gentle music from the radio. Xander closed his eyes and savoured the moment and the feel of Buffy as they danced. Buffy rested her head against his chest and inhaled the warm, comforting scent that was Xander.
They danced to the music, and when the song was over, Buffy looked into Xander's eyes. At that very moment, Buffy had her answer. Her search of "The One" was over. Buffy had fallen in love with her Xander shaped friend.
Her question was now if he still loved her.
"Xander?"
"Yeah Buff."
"Do you think that Sharon might be related to Willow?" Buffy asked Xander as they lay on their beds in the little alcove that had become there home away from home. Xander thought for a moment then shook his head.
"No, if I remember correctly Willow's great grandmother was named Mia and lived in Belgium. She fought the Nazis with the Belgium underground before fleeing to Spain. She fell for some American GI or something, fell pregnant to the GI who went missing soon there after, and immigrated to America to search for him after the war. Thus is the story of the Rosenburg clan."
Buffy resisted the urge to ask about what Xander's family did during the war. The subject of his family was something best avoided. The Scooby Gang was his family now. He would protect them with his life, and they would do the same.
How many times had Xander jumped into the fray to save them? He always put himself between them and danger. The very reason that he was here with her was because he tried to take the magic blast for Buffy. He was an ordinary guy in extraordinary times.
He wasn't perfect and there were times when Buffy could have happily killed him. But looking back she could see that he was trying to look after Buffy as best he could. Buffy felt a little annoyed; she was an adult and the Slayer and really didn't need someone to try to nanny her. However she was grateful that he was here to watch her back.
Buffy hoped that occasionally when he watched her back, he also checked out her butt.
With the thoughts of Xander and her slow dancing together, Buffy pulled her privacy blanket across and went to sleep.
Buffy awoke with a start, her senses alert. Someone had entered their alcove. Peeking around a corner of the privacy blanket, she saw Xander was fast asleep, naked other than the thin sheet that prevented good viewing becoming great viewing.
Reluctantly, she took her eyes off Xander's sleeping form and looked at the intruder.
It was Sharon.
Sharon moved to the side of Xander's bed and gently shook him awake. Xander awoke in confusion and was about to ask Sharon what was going on but was silenced by Sharon's finger over his lips. Xander's eyes boggled when Sharon quickly undressed and pulled the sheet off Xander.
Buffy couldn't help but to watch Sharon make love to a totally stunned Xander. Buffy felt hurt in a way she could hardly describe.
Afterwards, Sharon quietly left, leaving a bewildered Xander, and a devastated Buffy.
The next day Buffy and Xander hardly said a word to each other. Xander was quiet, lost in deep and troubling thoughts. Buffy sat nursing her hurt and not a small amount of anger.
When Xander got up for a walk, Buffy quietly followed him. She hid as Xander found Sharon and pulled her into a storage area to talk. Xander spent a few uncomfortable moments getting himself together before speaking.
"I know you can't understand what I'm saying, but I really need to say it anyway.
"Last night was nice. Unexpected, definately. But nice. I guess the story of my entire love life could be described as unexpected.
"But back home I've got a girlfriend waiting, and if you knew Anya then you would know that she isn't one to be kept waiting. I care for Anya, I really do, but last night made me think about everything.
"All my life, all I wanted was someone to love me and for me to love them. Willow loved me, but I guess I was afraid to love her the way she wanted because if things went bad I would be totally alone. I needed her to be best friend Willow, not girlfriend Willow.
"With Anya it's different. I want to love her, and I want her to love me. She needs someone to help her navigate through her new mortal life. But she doesn't really understand what love is. I know that she occasionally sleeps with other guys. Before me she hadn't had all that much experience with men. Well, in a good intimate way that is. And I can understand her feeling constrained sometime, feeling the need to broaden her experience, so to speak.
"I know that Anya really cares for me a lot. But she doesn't love me. I'm not really sure she knows exactly what love is. I always hoped I could be patient and teach her what love is. That one day she would come to love me and I would love her and we'd live happily ever after. But after thinking about it, I would be living a lie.
"No matter how much I try to deny it, or delude myself, or bury it, I've ever only loved one girl in my silly life. She has always made it clear that she doesn't think of me that way. To her, I'm her Xander shaped friend. I'm the Puffy Xander she can take her frustrations out on or get comfort from.
"I would do anything she wants, be anything she wants. She wants me to be her friend then I can do that, no matter how hard it is to be so close to her and not tell her how much I love her. To me, she isn't just a pretty girl or the Slayer. She's just Buffy.
"Riley couldn't hack that, and in his own way Deadboy had his own problems with it too. Buffy has a calling and any man that wants to be in her life has to cope with that. For the last five years I've coped with it. Over the years her calling has become mine in a way. Even if Buffy wasn't around anymore I'd still fight the good fight. I may not be able to do much, but at least I'm doing something.
"When all this is over and I get back home, I'm going to have to talk to Anya and explain how I feel. It's not going to be easy but I have to be honest with her. I owe her that much. Then after that, I'm going back to being Buffy's Xander shaped friend. I might not be able to tell her I lover her, but I'll show her how much I love her by being whatever she needs me to be." Xander stood up and pulled a gold heart shaped locket from his pocket and gave it to Sharon.
"I was going to give that to Anya before all this happened, but I want you to have it. You helped me see things clearly. My purpose in life is to look after Buffy in any way she needs me to. Thank you for helping me see that." Xander gently caressed Sharon's face before leaving.
Hidden in the shadows, Buffy wept silently with sadness and joy. He truly loved her.
An hour later Buffy was roaming around in search of Xander. She needed to talk to him, to explain how she felt. Instead she ran into Nancy.
"There you are." Nancy said. "I've been looking for you for half an hour." Buffy was a little alarmed at the tone of Nancy's voice.
"What's wrong?" the Slayer asked worried.
"Your leaving, now." Nancy told her hurriedly and started towards the entrance.
"Leaving? Why? What about Xander?"
"Xander is fine. He already left with group one. We are taking you two down to the coast to meet a British submarine. They will take you and Xander to London." Nancy said as she and Buffy arrived at the front entrance of the hideout. There a group of Resistance fighters was waiting.
"Buffy, go with Marko and the others. They'll take you to the coast."
"But where are you going?" Buffy asked the Resistance leader. Nancy gave a little wicked smile.
"There is going to be a little train accident that will keep the Nazis busy for a few hours." Buffy wasn't really sure what to say.
"I don't know how to thank you..." Buffy started but Nancy cut her off.
"You can thank me after the war is over. Now get going." Nancy commanded. Buffy and the group left the hide out and headed for the surface.
It was a tense journey through the town. Moving quietly through the shadows to avoid the Nazi patrols, the group followed the road out of the town and towards the sea. The moon was high in the sky providing a little light as it shone through the passing clouds.
They reached a heavily wooded area near the ocean where they met up with Xander and the others. Buffy found Xander hiding behind a log and hugged him with relief and joy. She looked at him in the dim light.
"What's going on?" asked Buffy.
"We're waiting for the submarine to turn up. There might be some SS in the area so we're being very quiet to avoid undue attention. We'll be OK." Xander reassured her. No sooner had the words left his mouth, a burst of gun fire shattered the silence of the night.
A fire fight had erupted as the SS and the Resistance clashed. Buffy and Xander could do nothing but cringe behind their log as the sound of battle rose. Rounds thumped into their log as they watched Marko give orders to his fellow Resistance fighters. There was occasional explosion of a hand grenade and the gurgling scream as people were cut down. Nothing could prepare Buffy and Xander for the horror of war.
The body of an SS soldier was hurled over their log by the blast of a nearby grenade. Under the leadership of Marko, the Resistance seemed to be gaining the upper hand. But then a bullet tore through Marko and, leaderless, the Resistance began to falter and fall back. Xander cursed and started crawling towards the dead SS soldier. He grabbed the gun and quickly checked it. Satisfied it was in working order, he grabbed extra ammo and a grenade and headed back to Buffy.
"Xander, what the hell do you think you're doing?" she demanded to know. Looking at Xander, she saw the same serious look on his face she saw that Halloween so many years ago.
"We got a boat to catch." he said sternly. Quickly looking over their log he grabbed Buffy and headed in the direction of the beach. They sprinted from one bit of cover to another. All around them the deadly crack of bullets filled to air.
Ahead of them a SS soldier appeared out of the gathering gloom. The figure was cut down from a burst of fire from Xander. Another figure was sent flying from a Buffy upper cut. Together they made their way to the sand dunes that backed the beach.
Together they crouched in a depression between two dunes. Xander and Buffy surveyed their surroundings.
"You should be safe here." Xander told the Slayer as he got up. Using her enhanced strength, Buffy dragged him back down.
"You're not going anywhere Xander!" she said determinedly. Xander twisted himself out of her grip.
"You've got no say in this Buff. Of the two of us, who knows anything about being a soldier?"
"This is no time to be a hero!"
"You don't get it, do you Buffy? You are the hero here, not me. You get back home and you'll save the world for the millionth time. You are the reason for the need for the plural of apocalypse. You die, the world dies. My job is to make sure you can be there to save the world even if that means that I don't make it." hissed Xander.
"Xander, you'll get killed!" Buffy pleaded. Xander looked her square in the eyes.
"Better me than you." he said before disappearing into the night.
Buffy hugged her knees to her chest to ward off the cool on shore breeze. Alone, she remembered when she went to fight Angelus and send him to Hell.
Xander had shown up with a broken arm and armed only with a rock, ready to fight the scourge of Europe. Xander lied to her then about Willow trying to restore Angel's soul. Looking back, she saw that it really didn't have anything to do with Xander being jealous of Angel. Xander made a judgement call on what was best to protect her. Xander had gone to a reluctant Angel for help to save Buffy from the Master because, despite the fact that they hated each other, only if they worked together could they save Buffy.
He was like that.
Whatever it took, whatever he could do, Xander did it for Buffy. Even if it meant dying.
Out of the corner of her eye something flew through the air and landed on the sand 8 or 9 feet away.
Grenade!
Barely had her mind registered the fact when somebody knocked her to the ground.
Buffy's world rocked in confusion as the grenade exploded. Her ears ringing and her head spinning, she struggled from under the body of whoever had knocked her to the ground. To her unending horror, a pair of familiar chocolate brown eyes blinked at her.
Xander.
He had taken half a dozen grenade fragments for Buffy, one of which had torn through his lung and was filling with blood. Buffy head Xander's head in her arms and wept.
"Don't cry." Xander said weakly. Buffy wiped away the blood that escaped from his lips.
"You're not allowed to die on me Xander! I won't allow it!"
"We all got to go some time, Buff. Look after Willow for me. Please."
"No! You look after Willow yourself! You're not going to die! You can't! You're going to live and we're going to have our first date and dance and laugh and make love and live happily ever after because you're not going to die!" Buffy babbled desperately. Xander looked up at her, a peaceful look on his face.
"Can I have you?" he asked and lay still.
Buffy screamed as her heart and soul was torn with grief.
Soldiers were approaching but Buffy didn't care. Nothing mattered any more. She prayed that they would kill her quickly.
"Over here lads!" an English voice yelled. It was a group of British commandos from the submarine. They quickly went to where Xander and Buffy lay. Totally numb, Buffy just sat there as they checked Xander's pulse.
"We got a weak pulse here!"
Those words had an electrifying effect on Buffy.
He was alive!
Frantically they bandaged Xander's wounds. When they were done, the commandos went to carry Xander but Buffy grabbed Xander and carried him as if he was a small child rather than a grown man. Together, they ran down the beach to the inflatable raft.
Behind her, Buffy heard one commando say to his companion:
"Bloody hell! Love does give you the strength of 10 men!"
It was a happier and healthier Xander who sat on Willow's bed in her dorm room. Curled up with him was a smiling Buffy who was still relishing the sensation of Xander holding her close.
Willow for her part was so happy that her two best friends in the world had found each other. She had listened to their story in fascination as Buffy told her of Nancy and fighting the SS. When they had finished, Willow started to rummage through an old shoe box looking for her great grandmothers medals from the war to show Buffy.
Something in the box caught Xander's eye. He picked it up and stared at it intensely.
"Where did you get this?" he asked in a shaky voice.
"That? It was my great grandmothers. My great grandfather gave it to her before he disappeared during the war. Why?" Willow grew concerned as she saw Xander pale as he looked at what he held.
A gold heart shaped locket. The same gold heart shaped locket he had given Sharon. Xander went catatonic for a few moments.
"What is it? What's the matter Xander?" Willow asked him frantically. It took Xander a while to be able to speak again.
"Uh, Wills." Xander said very shakily.
"Yeah?"
"I've just figured out why we've got the same blood type."