Title: A Breed Apart
Author: Knife Hand
Feedback: Constructive feedback appreciated, flames unappreciated
Spoilers: Some, mostly early series.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy. I would buy the show but I am broke
Category: Buffy/Xander
Summary: On her first day at Sunnydale High, Buffy finds an odd kinship to a fellow student and something she never knew about herself.
AN: The beginning of this fic follows the premier episodes of series one, Welcome to the Hellmouth/The Harvest, and assumes that events occur as in the episode unless stated otherwise.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Xander was skating along on the footpath outside Sunnydale High when he felt something he had never felt before. Looking around he saw a new girl, a petite girl with blond hair that he felt a kinship to and his loneliness faded a bit. When he looked back to where he was going he saw the railing right in front of him. Running on pure instinct he somersaulted over the railing and then pretended that the railing had flipped him.
********
"I really don't understand this attitude. You, you've accepted your duty, you, you've slain vampires before..." Giles said.
"Yeah, and I've both been there and done that, and I'm moving on." Buffy responded.
"I'm afraid you can't." Came a voice from the stacks.
A figure stepped into view from behind the stacks, which Buffy recognised as Xander.
"And why not?" Buffy asked angrily.
"Because you are not like them." Xander said. "And I'm not talking about being the Slayer, good for you by the way. I know you've felt it. The loneliness, the pain, the feeling that you don't quite belong in the world.
"You were always stronger and faster than you friends, but you hid it. You felt things you could never explain, heard conversations of people who were too far away. You sensed things that no one else could. You healed fast, even before becoming the Slayer.
"Were you ever sure you lost a fingertip or a toe or something but when you looked a few hours later, or the next day, it was as if nothing had happened? Or maybe you felt as if the whole world slowed and only you were moving a normal speed. You felt it, when you came here, that the loneliness got slightly less, didn't you?"
Buffy slowly nodded. Xander had been looking in her eyes the entire time that he had been speaking, searching for recognition that he found.
"Yes. How do you know all this?" Buffy asked, almost desperately.
"Because I am like you. I've felt the same thing. I never thought that one of us would become the Slayer though, we are so few." Xander responded.
"Excuse me, but when you say we, I get the distinct impression that you mean something specific. To what are you referring?" Giles said.
"Huh?" Buffy said.
"I was referring to our species. We are Dampir. Human Vampire hybrids, although not the vampire you get here on the Hellmouth." Xander replied. "We are from a different breed of Vampire that are not evil and blend into humanity rather than raging to destroy it. We are mostly outcasts, never fully accepted by either race, if they know what we are, which our Vampire kin do.
"My mother was a Vampire and she left me her journals and letters. I believe that Buffy's father was also a Vampire. We have Vampiric strength and speed, Buffy's will be enhanced by her being the Slayer. Sometimes we can move so fast that the world around us seems to slow, this also comes from our Vampire kin, and we can regenerate. Otherwise, apart from heightened senses, we are completely human, except for our lifespan."
"Two questions. One, what is a Hellmouth? And two, what is different about our lifespan." Buffy asked.
"Well, this town is on the Hellmouth, basically a huge demon magnet that will destroy the world if opened and the average lifespan of a Dampir is about two hundred years." Xander replied.
"Oh." Buffy responded before fainting.
Xander was ten feet from her when she fainted but, using his speed, he caught her easily before she hit the ground. As soon as Buffy was in Xander's arms calmness fell over her face.
"Contact with other Dampir calms us. Just so you know, we don't drink blood." Xander said to Giles.
********
Buffy ran out of the mausoleum and hears a vampire growl and a scream. She quickly ran towards the scream and staked the vampire just as it was about to get Willow. Xander came running up and quickly checked out Buffy and Willow.
"They got Jesse. There were too many." Xander said.
Xander picked Willow up from the ground and carried her off with Buffy following closely.
"Ok. We need to get her inside. We'll talk to Giles in the morning and see if we can find where they took Jesse, then you can track them." Xander said.
"Right." Buffy said.
********
Xander and Willow were waiting in the library for Buffy to return. Willow had initially freaked over the existence of Vampires and the fact that both Xander and Buffy were Dampir, however she quickly buried herself in research. Buffy walked in and everyone looked up.
"Did you find Jesse?" Willow asked.
Buffy nodded slowly and subconsciously let of a mournful whimper.
"Son of a Bitch!" Xander exclaimed.
"What? Is Jesse dead?" Willow asked concerned.
"Worse." Xander said before moving over to hug Buffy and giving off a comforting pur to which Buffy purred back.
"That is a little disturbing." Giles commented.
"So, Giles! Got anything that can make this day any worse?" Buffy asked.
********
"It's locked!" Buffy said, trying the door of the Bronze. "I can't break through this. I'm so stupid."
"Hey. You didn't know that you'd get grounded." Xander said. "Giles, Wills, try the back, we'll go in another way."
"Get the exits clear and the people out, that's all." Buffy said.
"Wills, remember, Jesse's gone, do what you have to, to defend yourself." Xander said.
Giles and Willow ran off towards the back of the building while Buffy and Xander made their way to the roof. Looking through the skylight, Buffy and Xander saw one guard on the catwalk and Luke on the stage. Xander accurately threw a stake dusting the guard before they made their entrance. Buffy and Xander dived through the skylight, somersaulting in mid air and landing impressively on the pool table, back to back and on one knee, Buffy facing the stage and Xander facing the doors.
"You!" Luke said.
"Yah, me. So what of it?" Buffy replied.
"I will kill you. The Master will rise and all of your kind, all the race of men, will die. Then we, the race of Vampires, will rule the world in blood." Luke proclaimed.
"Ok, now that is just stupid." Buffy said, getting a look of confusion from Luke. "First of all, you kill all the humans then what are you going to eat? Huh? Secondly, you vampires are not a race, you are simply infected, a plague. Finally, we are not human. We are Dampir."
Some of the older vampires looked worried by the last remark and the younger ones looked confused. Xander let off a low growl and they both performed a twisting forward somersault while gripping pool ques that they had grabbed from the table. Buffy staked a vampire with the pool que then performed a series of one handed back flips towards the stage ending with a twisting reverse somersault from a single handed handstand, a routine that would make an Olympic gymnast jealous.
Xander staked a nearby fledgling with his pool que before breaking it in half and taking the fight to the guards near the door. While Xander dusted the guards and opened the doors, Buffy engaged Luke and the back door opened revealing Giles and Willow.
"Everybody out!" Xander yelled and people started running for the doors.
On the stage, Buffy was desperately fighting Luke, however her pool que was getting in the way.
"Xander, switch." Buffy called, doing a back flip that allowed her feet to solidly connect with Luke's jaw.
Buffy threw her pool que at Xander and he threw his two stakes, the broken halves of his pool que, back to Buffy. Xander caught the whole pool que and began to lay waste to the vampires around him, using it like a quarterstaff. Buffy caught the two stakes; however a crescent kick from Luke knocked the stake out of her left hand. While Buffy exchanged more blows with Luke, Xander was dusting vampire after vampire, mostly fledglings, barely even flinching when he staked Jesse.
Suddenly Xander came up against a blond female vampire who was strong. He battled her for a while, exchanging blows and blocks. Finally Xander used his pool que to block a kick, causing it to break against his chest. Xander quickly used one end of the broken que to knock out the vampire with a blow to the head. Xander looked up at the stage and saw Buffy was in trouble with Luke, so Xander growled loudly. The growl was an alteration of the Dampir languages' standard danger signal, roughly translated as 'Duck, loved one.' but was slightly confused as the inflections that indicated sister, mate and friend were all present in the call.
Reacting on instinct, Buffy performed a split, allowing Xander to throw his stake into Luke's right shoulder, distracting the vampire long enough for Buffy to stake him. The remaining vampires ran and when Xander looked down the vampire that he had knocked out was gone. Buffy jumped down off the stage and ran to Xander.
Still running on instinct they both purred and gently sniffed the other's neck to see if they were ok, extending the treatment to Willow and Giles, who they considered part of their 'family' when they approached. When they finally finished, after discovering everyone was safe, they proceeded out of the Bronze.
"That was slightly weird. With the sniffing and the purring." Willow said.
"Sorry if that disturbed you Wills. It was instinctive, you are our 'family' and we were making sure you were ok." Xander said.
"At leat it's over." Willow responded.
"No it's not. That was not the first attack, nor will it be the last. The people in there will rationalise or forget or both. We, and others, fight and die for them and they will never know it unless we lose and then they are dead. That's just the way it is." Xander said as they walked.
********
Xander walked up to the door of the Summers' house and knocked. The direct sun was shining on him as Buffy's mother opened the door.
"Hello. Can I help you?" She asked.
"Hello Mrs. Summers. I'm Xander, one of Buffy's friends. I just came over to show her some history stuff, about some of the town's resident's." Xander said showing Joyce Summers the stack of folders he had in his hands.
Joyce stepped back and allowed him to pass without a word.
'Smart woman, she knows the town is not safe, if only subconsciously.' Xander thought as he entered the house.
"Buffy. Your friend Xander is here." Joyce called up the stairs.
Buffy appeared at the top of the stairs and smiled down at Xander.
"Cool. Come on up. Mum, we'll be in my room." Buffy said.
Xander and Buffy made their way to Buffy's room and soon found themselves flaked out, surrounded by Xander's biological mother's journals and letters. Xander was more enjoying the comfort of being near Buffy that reading; he had read them all before.
"Grose. It says here that we can survive on blood, but we don't have to. It also says that we have a 'game face'. Do you know what it looks like?" Buffy asked.
Xander nodded his head sadly, his eyes filled with pain that Buffy could not see, due to the fact that his back was facing her.
"Yes. We get burnished golden eyes, not the sickly yellow of the Sunnydale vampires, and fangs. I've only used it twice." Xander said.
Buffy slipped off the bed, where she had been lying, and sat next to Xander, wrapping an arm around his shoulders in a gesture of comfort.
"Want to tell me about it? It might help." Buffy said her voice and eyes showing nothing but concern and a wish to comfort him.
"It only happens when I'm really mad. The first time was when I was five. My adopted parents were fighting. He was drunk and he was hitting her. At the time I did not know I was adopted and I got so mad. He got frightened when he saw my face, I held him up against the wall, his feet off the ground and told him never to hurt her again. He quit drinking after that. He goes to AA meetings and a psychiatrist a couple of times a week now. The other time was to protect Willow."
Xander paused to gather himself for the next part of the tale.
"Wills was attacked when we were seven, by a human. She was almost raped. I ended up killing the guy, I beat him to death. I broke every bone in his body before he died. She does not remember the incident but she changed after that night. She became very shy and for a long time would not trust anyone except me, not even Jesse."
Silent tears streamed down Xander's face as he recited the story, reliving the horror. Buffy was shocked and not that Xander had killed the guy, but at what the guy had done to Willow. She would have kept him alive and in agony for weeks before finally killing him. Buffy waited silently as the anger and grief caused by the memories subsided, which took a few minutes.
She was just about to speak when her mother quickly knocked and entered the room. Buffy's arm was no longer around Xander's shoulder, which was lucky as Joyce seemed to be looking for anything amiss.
"Do either of you want anything to eat?" Joyce asked.
"Yah that would be great." Buffy said, picking up another journal.
"I'll come and help. Keep reading, Buff, I've already been through them." Xander said before leaving the room with Joyce, to Buffy's surprise.
TBC
Author: Knife Hand
Feedback: Constructive feedback appreciated, flames unappreciated
Spoilers: Some, mostly early series.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy. I would buy the show but I am broke
Category: Buffy/Xander
Summary: On her first day at Sunnydale High, Buffy finds an odd kinship to a fellow student and something she never knew about herself.
AN: The beginning of this fic follows the premier episodes of series one, Welcome to the Hellmouth/The Harvest, and assumes that events occur as in the episode unless stated otherwise.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Xander was skating along on the footpath outside Sunnydale High when he felt something he had never felt before. Looking around he saw a new girl, a petite girl with blond hair that he felt a kinship to and his loneliness faded a bit. When he looked back to where he was going he saw the railing right in front of him. Running on pure instinct he somersaulted over the railing and then pretended that the railing had flipped him.
********
"I really don't understand this attitude. You, you've accepted your duty, you, you've slain vampires before..." Giles said.
"Yeah, and I've both been there and done that, and I'm moving on." Buffy responded.
"I'm afraid you can't." Came a voice from the stacks.
A figure stepped into view from behind the stacks, which Buffy recognised as Xander.
"And why not?" Buffy asked angrily.
"Because you are not like them." Xander said. "And I'm not talking about being the Slayer, good for you by the way. I know you've felt it. The loneliness, the pain, the feeling that you don't quite belong in the world.
"You were always stronger and faster than you friends, but you hid it. You felt things you could never explain, heard conversations of people who were too far away. You sensed things that no one else could. You healed fast, even before becoming the Slayer.
"Were you ever sure you lost a fingertip or a toe or something but when you looked a few hours later, or the next day, it was as if nothing had happened? Or maybe you felt as if the whole world slowed and only you were moving a normal speed. You felt it, when you came here, that the loneliness got slightly less, didn't you?"
Buffy slowly nodded. Xander had been looking in her eyes the entire time that he had been speaking, searching for recognition that he found.
"Yes. How do you know all this?" Buffy asked, almost desperately.
"Because I am like you. I've felt the same thing. I never thought that one of us would become the Slayer though, we are so few." Xander responded.
"Excuse me, but when you say we, I get the distinct impression that you mean something specific. To what are you referring?" Giles said.
"Huh?" Buffy said.
"I was referring to our species. We are Dampir. Human Vampire hybrids, although not the vampire you get here on the Hellmouth." Xander replied. "We are from a different breed of Vampire that are not evil and blend into humanity rather than raging to destroy it. We are mostly outcasts, never fully accepted by either race, if they know what we are, which our Vampire kin do.
"My mother was a Vampire and she left me her journals and letters. I believe that Buffy's father was also a Vampire. We have Vampiric strength and speed, Buffy's will be enhanced by her being the Slayer. Sometimes we can move so fast that the world around us seems to slow, this also comes from our Vampire kin, and we can regenerate. Otherwise, apart from heightened senses, we are completely human, except for our lifespan."
"Two questions. One, what is a Hellmouth? And two, what is different about our lifespan." Buffy asked.
"Well, this town is on the Hellmouth, basically a huge demon magnet that will destroy the world if opened and the average lifespan of a Dampir is about two hundred years." Xander replied.
"Oh." Buffy responded before fainting.
Xander was ten feet from her when she fainted but, using his speed, he caught her easily before she hit the ground. As soon as Buffy was in Xander's arms calmness fell over her face.
"Contact with other Dampir calms us. Just so you know, we don't drink blood." Xander said to Giles.
********
Buffy ran out of the mausoleum and hears a vampire growl and a scream. She quickly ran towards the scream and staked the vampire just as it was about to get Willow. Xander came running up and quickly checked out Buffy and Willow.
"They got Jesse. There were too many." Xander said.
Xander picked Willow up from the ground and carried her off with Buffy following closely.
"Ok. We need to get her inside. We'll talk to Giles in the morning and see if we can find where they took Jesse, then you can track them." Xander said.
"Right." Buffy said.
********
Xander and Willow were waiting in the library for Buffy to return. Willow had initially freaked over the existence of Vampires and the fact that both Xander and Buffy were Dampir, however she quickly buried herself in research. Buffy walked in and everyone looked up.
"Did you find Jesse?" Willow asked.
Buffy nodded slowly and subconsciously let of a mournful whimper.
"Son of a Bitch!" Xander exclaimed.
"What? Is Jesse dead?" Willow asked concerned.
"Worse." Xander said before moving over to hug Buffy and giving off a comforting pur to which Buffy purred back.
"That is a little disturbing." Giles commented.
"So, Giles! Got anything that can make this day any worse?" Buffy asked.
********
"It's locked!" Buffy said, trying the door of the Bronze. "I can't break through this. I'm so stupid."
"Hey. You didn't know that you'd get grounded." Xander said. "Giles, Wills, try the back, we'll go in another way."
"Get the exits clear and the people out, that's all." Buffy said.
"Wills, remember, Jesse's gone, do what you have to, to defend yourself." Xander said.
Giles and Willow ran off towards the back of the building while Buffy and Xander made their way to the roof. Looking through the skylight, Buffy and Xander saw one guard on the catwalk and Luke on the stage. Xander accurately threw a stake dusting the guard before they made their entrance. Buffy and Xander dived through the skylight, somersaulting in mid air and landing impressively on the pool table, back to back and on one knee, Buffy facing the stage and Xander facing the doors.
"You!" Luke said.
"Yah, me. So what of it?" Buffy replied.
"I will kill you. The Master will rise and all of your kind, all the race of men, will die. Then we, the race of Vampires, will rule the world in blood." Luke proclaimed.
"Ok, now that is just stupid." Buffy said, getting a look of confusion from Luke. "First of all, you kill all the humans then what are you going to eat? Huh? Secondly, you vampires are not a race, you are simply infected, a plague. Finally, we are not human. We are Dampir."
Some of the older vampires looked worried by the last remark and the younger ones looked confused. Xander let off a low growl and they both performed a twisting forward somersault while gripping pool ques that they had grabbed from the table. Buffy staked a vampire with the pool que then performed a series of one handed back flips towards the stage ending with a twisting reverse somersault from a single handed handstand, a routine that would make an Olympic gymnast jealous.
Xander staked a nearby fledgling with his pool que before breaking it in half and taking the fight to the guards near the door. While Xander dusted the guards and opened the doors, Buffy engaged Luke and the back door opened revealing Giles and Willow.
"Everybody out!" Xander yelled and people started running for the doors.
On the stage, Buffy was desperately fighting Luke, however her pool que was getting in the way.
"Xander, switch." Buffy called, doing a back flip that allowed her feet to solidly connect with Luke's jaw.
Buffy threw her pool que at Xander and he threw his two stakes, the broken halves of his pool que, back to Buffy. Xander caught the whole pool que and began to lay waste to the vampires around him, using it like a quarterstaff. Buffy caught the two stakes; however a crescent kick from Luke knocked the stake out of her left hand. While Buffy exchanged more blows with Luke, Xander was dusting vampire after vampire, mostly fledglings, barely even flinching when he staked Jesse.
Suddenly Xander came up against a blond female vampire who was strong. He battled her for a while, exchanging blows and blocks. Finally Xander used his pool que to block a kick, causing it to break against his chest. Xander quickly used one end of the broken que to knock out the vampire with a blow to the head. Xander looked up at the stage and saw Buffy was in trouble with Luke, so Xander growled loudly. The growl was an alteration of the Dampir languages' standard danger signal, roughly translated as 'Duck, loved one.' but was slightly confused as the inflections that indicated sister, mate and friend were all present in the call.
Reacting on instinct, Buffy performed a split, allowing Xander to throw his stake into Luke's right shoulder, distracting the vampire long enough for Buffy to stake him. The remaining vampires ran and when Xander looked down the vampire that he had knocked out was gone. Buffy jumped down off the stage and ran to Xander.
Still running on instinct they both purred and gently sniffed the other's neck to see if they were ok, extending the treatment to Willow and Giles, who they considered part of their 'family' when they approached. When they finally finished, after discovering everyone was safe, they proceeded out of the Bronze.
"That was slightly weird. With the sniffing and the purring." Willow said.
"Sorry if that disturbed you Wills. It was instinctive, you are our 'family' and we were making sure you were ok." Xander said.
"At leat it's over." Willow responded.
"No it's not. That was not the first attack, nor will it be the last. The people in there will rationalise or forget or both. We, and others, fight and die for them and they will never know it unless we lose and then they are dead. That's just the way it is." Xander said as they walked.
********
Xander walked up to the door of the Summers' house and knocked. The direct sun was shining on him as Buffy's mother opened the door.
"Hello. Can I help you?" She asked.
"Hello Mrs. Summers. I'm Xander, one of Buffy's friends. I just came over to show her some history stuff, about some of the town's resident's." Xander said showing Joyce Summers the stack of folders he had in his hands.
Joyce stepped back and allowed him to pass without a word.
'Smart woman, she knows the town is not safe, if only subconsciously.' Xander thought as he entered the house.
"Buffy. Your friend Xander is here." Joyce called up the stairs.
Buffy appeared at the top of the stairs and smiled down at Xander.
"Cool. Come on up. Mum, we'll be in my room." Buffy said.
Xander and Buffy made their way to Buffy's room and soon found themselves flaked out, surrounded by Xander's biological mother's journals and letters. Xander was more enjoying the comfort of being near Buffy that reading; he had read them all before.
"Grose. It says here that we can survive on blood, but we don't have to. It also says that we have a 'game face'. Do you know what it looks like?" Buffy asked.
Xander nodded his head sadly, his eyes filled with pain that Buffy could not see, due to the fact that his back was facing her.
"Yes. We get burnished golden eyes, not the sickly yellow of the Sunnydale vampires, and fangs. I've only used it twice." Xander said.
Buffy slipped off the bed, where she had been lying, and sat next to Xander, wrapping an arm around his shoulders in a gesture of comfort.
"Want to tell me about it? It might help." Buffy said her voice and eyes showing nothing but concern and a wish to comfort him.
"It only happens when I'm really mad. The first time was when I was five. My adopted parents were fighting. He was drunk and he was hitting her. At the time I did not know I was adopted and I got so mad. He got frightened when he saw my face, I held him up against the wall, his feet off the ground and told him never to hurt her again. He quit drinking after that. He goes to AA meetings and a psychiatrist a couple of times a week now. The other time was to protect Willow."
Xander paused to gather himself for the next part of the tale.
"Wills was attacked when we were seven, by a human. She was almost raped. I ended up killing the guy, I beat him to death. I broke every bone in his body before he died. She does not remember the incident but she changed after that night. She became very shy and for a long time would not trust anyone except me, not even Jesse."
Silent tears streamed down Xander's face as he recited the story, reliving the horror. Buffy was shocked and not that Xander had killed the guy, but at what the guy had done to Willow. She would have kept him alive and in agony for weeks before finally killing him. Buffy waited silently as the anger and grief caused by the memories subsided, which took a few minutes.
She was just about to speak when her mother quickly knocked and entered the room. Buffy's arm was no longer around Xander's shoulder, which was lucky as Joyce seemed to be looking for anything amiss.
"Do either of you want anything to eat?" Joyce asked.
"Yah that would be great." Buffy said, picking up another journal.
"I'll come and help. Keep reading, Buff, I've already been through them." Xander said before leaving the room with Joyce, to Buffy's surprise.
TBC