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summer_of_giles2017-07-30 08:07 pm
aaronlisa) wrote in summer_of_giles2017-07-30 08:07 pm
Entry tags:
FIC: Potential
Title: Potential
Author:aaronlisa
Fandom: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Characters: Rupert Giles, Faith Lehane
Rating: FR13
Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer belongs to Joss Whedon and company.
Notes: Set pre-series. Very AU. Written for the 2017summer_of_giles.
Summary: What if Giles wasn't chosen to be Buffy's Watcher.
Word Count: 621
The tea has a pleasant and fragrant aroma. It's smell is enticing and delicious. He savours the aroma on more time before taking a delicate sip of the tea. The moment it hits his tongue, he is disappointed. Not only is the tea bitter and burned but it's stale. So far he has yet to have a decent cup of tea since he's arrived - other than what he's brewed himself - and he loathes coffee. He shuts his eyes and wonders if Travers had been less vindictive, if his situation would have been different.
His dining companion slides into the booth across from him. Her crimson red lips curve into a sneer dissuading him from a casual conversation. Giles looks at her and wonders what exactly Travers expects him to do with the teenage girl sitting across from him. Her meagre file claims that she's sixteen years old but the heavily black lined eyes, crimson lips and tight clothing indicate that she's older.
Then again he can still recall what he was like at the same age. Sixteen going on thirty. Invincible and tough. Ready to take on the world and destroy it. He represses a shudder as he thinks of the mischief that he and Ethan got into. And he refused to even think about Eyghon.
"Take a picture, it'll last longer," Faith sneers at him.
Giles inhales what is supposed to be a calming breath but when he exhales it a moment later, he is anything but calm. How he wishes that he had been sent to Los Angeles instead of Merrick and Wesley Wyndham-Pryce. This hard girl across from him will be the death of him. He just knows it.
For a moment, he wonders how much trouble he will get into if he just gives her an allowance and allows her to do whatever it is she wants. The file had indicated that she can handle herself in a fight. And it's highly unlikely that she'll ever be called. Many Potentials aren't. The current Slayer and the one before her hadn't been known Potentials. The chances are pretty high that this tough girl in front of him won't be called.
He shuts his eyes as he takes another sip of his tea. In his mind, he can see his grandmother glaring at him in disapproval. And Giles knows that it's not because of the horrid tea he's drinking. He sets the cup down on the Formica table top with another sigh. He knows that things aren't going to be easy but he doesn't have it in him to write this girl off. Too many before him have already done so.
"Faith, you have a sacred destiny," Giles tells her. "You are a Potential."
She stares at him, her face is set in harsh lines of disbelief and anger. He swallows and finds the words in him, the words needed to convince her.
"You are a Potential now but in time you will be Chosen. You will be the one girl in all of the world to stand alone against the forces of darkness."
The words are familiar and trite but as he says them, he believes them. She will be the next Slayer. And for a moment, the harsh lines of her face dissolve and she's just a sixteen year old girl. And he wishes that he could take the words back again but once spoken, they can't be taken back.
He wonders what he's done. He wonders if things had gone differently what his life in sunny California would have been like instead of Boston. He pushes those thoughts away as Faith starts to ask him questions and he does his best to answer them.
Author:
aaronlisa Fandom: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Characters: Rupert Giles, Faith Lehane
Rating: FR13
Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer belongs to Joss Whedon and company.
Notes: Set pre-series. Very AU. Written for the 2017
summer_of_giles. Summary: What if Giles wasn't chosen to be Buffy's Watcher.
Word Count: 621
The tea has a pleasant and fragrant aroma. It's smell is enticing and delicious. He savours the aroma on more time before taking a delicate sip of the tea. The moment it hits his tongue, he is disappointed. Not only is the tea bitter and burned but it's stale. So far he has yet to have a decent cup of tea since he's arrived - other than what he's brewed himself - and he loathes coffee. He shuts his eyes and wonders if Travers had been less vindictive, if his situation would have been different.
His dining companion slides into the booth across from him. Her crimson red lips curve into a sneer dissuading him from a casual conversation. Giles looks at her and wonders what exactly Travers expects him to do with the teenage girl sitting across from him. Her meagre file claims that she's sixteen years old but the heavily black lined eyes, crimson lips and tight clothing indicate that she's older.
Then again he can still recall what he was like at the same age. Sixteen going on thirty. Invincible and tough. Ready to take on the world and destroy it. He represses a shudder as he thinks of the mischief that he and Ethan got into. And he refused to even think about Eyghon.
"Take a picture, it'll last longer," Faith sneers at him.
Giles inhales what is supposed to be a calming breath but when he exhales it a moment later, he is anything but calm. How he wishes that he had been sent to Los Angeles instead of Merrick and Wesley Wyndham-Pryce. This hard girl across from him will be the death of him. He just knows it.
For a moment, he wonders how much trouble he will get into if he just gives her an allowance and allows her to do whatever it is she wants. The file had indicated that she can handle herself in a fight. And it's highly unlikely that she'll ever be called. Many Potentials aren't. The current Slayer and the one before her hadn't been known Potentials. The chances are pretty high that this tough girl in front of him won't be called.
He shuts his eyes as he takes another sip of his tea. In his mind, he can see his grandmother glaring at him in disapproval. And Giles knows that it's not because of the horrid tea he's drinking. He sets the cup down on the Formica table top with another sigh. He knows that things aren't going to be easy but he doesn't have it in him to write this girl off. Too many before him have already done so.
"Faith, you have a sacred destiny," Giles tells her. "You are a Potential."
She stares at him, her face is set in harsh lines of disbelief and anger. He swallows and finds the words in him, the words needed to convince her.
"You are a Potential now but in time you will be Chosen. You will be the one girl in all of the world to stand alone against the forces of darkness."
The words are familiar and trite but as he says them, he believes them. She will be the next Slayer. And for a moment, the harsh lines of her face dissolve and she's just a sixteen year old girl. And he wishes that he could take the words back again but once spoken, they can't be taken back.
He wonders what he's done. He wonders if things had gone differently what his life in sunny California would have been like instead of Boston. He pushes those thoughts away as Faith starts to ask him questions and he does his best to answer them.
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Lovely, intriguing premise. Nicely done! And of course Giles winces at the tea. :)
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