Professional Life (Chapter Two: Awake and Alert at All Hours)

[protoneoromantic]

Sequel to Private Life (SoG2017)
Author:protoneoromantic
beta:gilescandy
Giles/Wesley
Rating:T
Word Count: 1568

Giles and Wesley sat reading their books in stony silence. Spending the entire day together had taken a toll on their already frosty professional relationship....“You know,” Giles ventured, “I am trying to find information on the threat the Sayers are actually facing at the moment. It might go a bit faster if you lent a hand.” ...Wesley ignored that entirely. He had already made his opinion on the subject quite clear. There was no need wasting valuable time researching the history of a dead demon and his useless amulet.

 

Afternoon faded to evening and drug on slowly into night. The library remained open long after the rest of the campus was dark and deserted, as usual. Giles and Wesley sat reading their books in stony silence. Spending the entire day together without an intermission longer than a stroll to the men's room had taken a toll on their already frosty professional relationship.

          Giles was researching the Demon Balthazar for a clue as to why Eliminati, who (like most vampires) were not know to be overly sentimental, would risk crossing swords with two Slayers at once just to retrieve a supposedly useless amulet. Meanwhile, Wesley browsed through the Watcher diaries, apparently thinking that he would come to know Buffy, Faith, and Giles better by reading about them than by talking to them.

“You know,” Giles ventured, trying to sound less annoyed than he actually felt, “I am trying to find information on the threat the Sayers are actually facing at the moment. It might go a bit faster if you lent a hand.”

Wesley ignored that entirely. He had already made his opinion on the subject quite clear. There was no need wasting valuable time researching the history of a dead demon and his useless amulet. The Elimanti themselves hardly posed a threat, there number being down to no more than two or three. Even if it took him a few days to bring Faith to heel, from what he'd read of her exploits, Buffy could manage them well enough on her own.

He had already patiently explained all of that to both Buffy and Giles of course, swallowing the indignity of explaining himself to the Ex-Watcher as the price of getting even one Slayer's cooperation. God, he could just hear what his superiors on the Council would say. We gave you this assignment because we thought you could handle yourself. How do you expect to rein in your Slayers, let alone defeat the forces of evil, if you can't even deal with the likes of Rupert Giles?

Speaking of the devil, Giles was staring at him. Expectantly. Those damnable green eyes pierced him like some sort of soul seeking laser. Had he just said something? Almost certainly.

Wesley played it off. Pretending to disdain whatever had just been said as unworthy of any answer, just as he had the invitation to put by his essential study into the workings of the team he was meant to lead to indulge in reading irrelevant nonsense for the sake of pure curiosity. “These are all of the diaries, then?” he said instead. “Yours included?” managing a reasonably cool and professional tone if he did say so himself.

“That's everything,” Mr. Giles noted crossly. “Knock yourself out. Please.” He added the last word 'under his breath' but clearly meant to be heard. Like a petulant child. Wesley aimed a reproachful look in the older man's direction, meaning to say something to that effect.

Their eyes locked for a moment and all Wesley's intended remonstrations fled from his mind leaving his tongue bound to the roof of his suddenly very dry mouth. Was it only anger that burned in the gaze that held his, or something more? It hardly mattered he told himself rather forcefully. Either form of passion meant nothing but danger and regret ahead. Neither was of any use to the work he had before him in this American purgatory.

Wesley turned away, only realizing after the fact that doing so could be seen as capitulation. Dear God, it was like being at school all over again. His eyes desperately searched out some thing in the text before him to support the proposition that he had been looking toward his books rather than away from a challenge.

“Ah yes.” He said, covering his shock and relief in a semblance of smug self-satisfaction, which became more genuine as he began to read. “Here is your first entry. 'The Slayer is willful and insolent.' That would be our girl, wouldn't it.” It actually described both of them pretty well, truth be told.

“You have to get to know her,” Giles murmured, genuinely embarrassed. Clearly speaking only of Buffy. Not bothering to argue the point when it came to Faith.

“... 'Her Abuse of the English language is such that I understand only every other sentence.'” he continued, enjoying the disconcerting effect this recital was having on his redundant predecessor, perhaps just a bit too much. Taking a small measure of vengeance for all the tiny ways in which Mr. Giles had undermined his authority throughout the day. “this is going to make fascinating reading.”

Giles sighed heavily and resolved to stop giving the pillock quite so much opportunity to ridicule him by holding his own tongue until Buffy returned. But that thought lead into another, rather worrisome one.

He looked at his watch. It confirmed that Buffy had been gone over three and a half hours. The Gleaves crypt was only about eight miles away. She should have been able to kill the last two or three Eliminati, retrieve the amulet, stop at the Bronze for a celebratory dance, change her wardrobe, and turn up at the library with a box of jelly donuts by now.

“She should be here by now,” he said aloud. Not bothering to hide the worry in his voice. He was right to be worried and so should her official Watcher have been, if he were up to the job.

The snide little pustule looked at his own watch. “Not to fret,” he said with insufferable smugness, nonchalantly popping a mint into his mouth as he spoke, making a spectacle of his indifference. “My mission scenario has her back in exactly one minute.” He tapped the watch for emphasis. “Shouldn't be any trouble.” Pillock.

Seconds ticked by. Too many. The air in the room seemed to be getting thinner. Wesley went on reading in triumphant silence. Useless to the cause and to Buffy.

Giles was on the point of rising, of setting off in search of her; damn protocol, caution, his suspended driving license, and most especially Wesley Wydam-Pryce; when Buffy swaggered in. She had the amulet in her hand and Faith in tow, just as instructed. Wesley tapped his watch and smiled smugly. One minute.

Wesley's smugness didn't last long. Both Slayer's started laying into him at once. Excoriating him for sending them out so ill prepared thanks to his wildly inaccurate assessment of the enemy, whom Buffy described with caustic irony as “not nearly extinct enough.”

“Seriously, though,” Faith echoed, a bit more blasé perhaps, but still with a significant bit of censure in her tone. “The evening's entertainment was not as advertised. It was almost interesting.” Wesley had the unpleasant feeling that she meant to say it was almost fatal.

Worst of all, they handed the amulet to Giles without even being prompted, as if Wesley weren't even there. The ExWatcher took it, peered at it, turned it over in his hand, hefted it for weight, pocketed it for 'safe keeping', and dismissed the Slayers to “Go and get some rest,” without so much as a glance in the direction of the man who was supposed to be in charge of this operation.

The Slayers turned and made a beeline for the door. “Now wait just a moment!” Wesley ordered them firmly. They ignored him and continued on their way. He turned to Mr. Giles to entreat his assistance and found the villain smiling wickedly. The fact that his wicked smile was so undeniably attractive only made Wesley feel more hopelessly ineffectual. He could barely master himself, let alone anyone else, least of all the Slayers.

Wesley's shoulder's slumped. What was the point? He decided to call it a night and try again in the morning. All he needed was to get a good night's rest. In his brand new and slightly too firm bed. In his Spartan, Council-funded, flat with none of the comforts of home. Which was located across town. Five miles of vampire infested nightscapes away. In a town in which, Mr. Giles had given him to understand, vampires roved the night in taxicabs, some of them looking for more than a fair.

“Erm...” he said awkwardly, examining his hands, “Could I perhaps trouble you for a ride home?”

Mr. Giles cleared his throat and replied, sounding unpleasantly embarrassed himself, “Only if you'd be willing to drive.” Wesley looked at him in surprise. This time it was Mr. Giles who looked away, feigning an interest in the alignment of his cuff links. “My license had been suspended,” he admitted. “I narrowly escaped capture while driving to work this morning, and the patrols are doubled at this hour.”

“So, in actually,” Wesley translated, feeling a bit less defeated, “It is I who must do you the favor of seeing you home this evening.”

“Well it is still my car,” Mr. Giles mumbled sullenly.

Wesley sighed but held his tongue. They had only ten minutes or so left to get through together before each would be free to sleep peacefully in his own bed and gather the strength he needed to get through the next day. Surely they could go that long without arguing. And they might have. If Wesley could have only remembered to drive on the wrong side of the road.