be careful Winnow, you're me, just a short couple of months ago.

Anyone remember this?

Can't say I remember it, ita, but it's certainly pretty.

Yerp!

Awww. Warm fuzzys come from me when I think of it.

Oooooh, Deb! Lovely! Is there more?

(quibble - how would you feel about "Love" rather than "Luv"? I can't see Mrs Peel, who's so formal that Steed only once or twice calls her Emma, thinking of it as spelled l.u.v. YMrsPeelMV. But loving it otherwise.)

Kat! Andrew! Yay! Oh, I liked that.

Anyone remember this?

Hell yeah. We should update. I've got Buffyverse stuff that's not there, I'm fairly sure.

Um. Who's running it these days? Is it SA?

Heh. Fay, there is indeed more; she's meeting with Steed and yes, I will totally change the luv to love. I was riffing on my own memories of Just South of Oxford Street in that point in time; everyone talked as if they came from Liverpoool. It was a Beatles thing.

I'll post as I go along; today is a honker, though. Stay tuned (or I can e you with some when it's ready).

Thanks all. Glad you liked the Andrew.

Deena, the expanded Gunn is good. Well, everyone's stuff is so good.

Ah, fuck it.

Okay. Here's the start of me answering my own freaking challenge. Like, 1600+ expositiony words. Subject to MASSIVE changes, as I may decide to totally cut some stuff. Maybe. I haven't decided. I'm still not sure where I'm going, I'm letting the bunny lead me.

Dying for the third time would have been the charm. Buffy realized that when Dawn was killed, and again when she found Giles's body, carefully arranged on her front porch. She left her home, what was left of her friends and family, but that didn't stop the remaining demons and vampires from coming after her. It wasn't like evil went away, just because the Hellmouth closed; it didn't even bother to take a sick day.

She managed seven years of running and hiding before she swallowed the last bits of her pride and went to L.A., looking for some sort of help. Wishing she'd died back then wasn't the same thing as having an open death wish, and she couldn't keep fighting alone if she wanted to live. She'd thought she was a target as the Slayer, with every wannabe big bad wanting a piece of her. Maybe she had been, but it was nothing compared to the target she made with the power stripped away and nothing left but the girl.

Not that she really got a chance to be a girl.

It was easy enough to find him. Not so easy to get an appointment to see him, so she found herself watching his building and waiting for an in. When she found it, she was blunt.

"There's no such thing as an ex-Slayer Protection plan. You got me into this mess, now get me out."

Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, once and former Watcher, translator of the spell that allowed her to give up her status as the Chosen One, dropped his coffee at the sound of her voice.

• **

She looked awful. That was his first thought. His second was to wonder what she was doing there and what exactly it was she expected him to do.

"Buffy, you knew the risks when you chose your course of action."

Tired hazel eyes assessed him, and seemed to find him wanting. "Did I? I don't think anyone bothered to tell me there'd still be enough of them left over to be a problem, that they'd try to get to me through my friends, my family. Or that when they got sick of that, it would be open season on Buffy Summers. You should have just killed me."

"You were given a chance, that's more than Faith had. It's more than most people are given. As unfortunate as your situation may be, it's not my responsibility."

Her face hardened, a frown crossing her brow. "It was about her, wasn't it?" Her voice held the quiet conviction of one who has just found the last piece to a puzzle. "It wasn't about saving the world, or restoring the balance, or whatever else I was told. You did it for her, so she wouldn't have my blood on her hands."

She was shrewder than he'd ever given her credit for. "The choices were to kill you or to do the spell. Faith was aware of that. She was also aware that Spike would kill anyone who came near you, and that she was the only one strong enough to go through him."

"But it worked too quickly, or maybe not quickly enough, and she died anyway."

"Yes."

When she spoke again, her voice was quiet, almost desperate. "You were my Watcher too, once. Do you really think your responsibility's over and done with, just because Faith's dead and I'm useless?"

"Buffy..."

"Do you?"

He didn't need this reminder of past failures and misjudgments, nor did he have time for it, not with a backlog of parchments sitting on his desk, waiting to be translated. Guilt was a luxury he no longer allowed himself to feel. Damn her for stirring the beginnings of it. "What do you expect me to do?"

The only answer she gave was a stifled sob of relief. Wesley watched appalled as tears spilled from her eyes and down her face in a flash-flood, washing away what he now realized were several carefully applied layers of make-up and revealing the telltale yellow and green of fading bruises. The parchments would have to wait; they were beginning to attract attention. He took her by the arm, guiding up the street, through the lobby, and down to the parking garage.

He buckled her into the passenger seat and made a quick call to his secretary. "I'll be out for the rest of the day, and I don't expect I'll be answering my phone, so don't bother to forward my calls."

She'd passed out from exhaustion by the time his car pulled into the garage of his townhouse. She didn't stir when he undid her seat belt and carried her up the stairs to the guest room, nor when he took a washcloth to her face, then stripped her down to her undergarments to examine the extent of the damage.

Swearing under his breath, he dressed her in one of his old shirts and covered her with a blanket, hoping he had enough alcohol on hand to erase what he'd seen.

***

//She shouldn't be working a second shift, but money's tight. It's only an hour or two after sunset. She should be able to make it back to her apartment if she's careful. Just make sure the janitor has cleaned the bathroom, lock up, and sprint to the bus station. Easy. She checks the men's room. Clean and ready for the morning. Something doesn't feel right, but she chalks it down to her usual unease at being away from home after dark. The women's room door is sticky, so she shoves at it with her hip until it opens. By the time she smells the blood over the bleach, it's too late. Cold hands grab her, pull her down into a pool of Clorox and bodily fluids. There are two of them waiting for her in the restroom, mouths stretched in blood-smudged leers. The taller one's talking, pinning her legs while the other one keeps her arms trapped above her head, but she can't hear what he's saying over the rushing sound in her ears. She can see the plunger off to her left, next to what's left of the janitor, but she can't throw them off so she can get to it. When she does get an arm free for a second, a fist hits her jaw, pushing her face to into the cement floor, the pain blossoming along with the realization that they're not just going to kill her. All she can think when she hears her nylons rip is that they're her last pair without runs. Then she forces away any thoughts that aren't about getting to the stupid plunger. When they go to trade off, she gets lucky.//

She woke up screaming with the taste of blood in her mouth.

"When?" Wesley was sitting at the foot of the bed, a tumbler full of something brown in his hands.

There was no point in pretending she didn't understand the question; he'd undressed her, so he'd seen the damage, and it wasn't the type you could claim came from walking into a door or falling down some stairs. "Last month. Vampire. Kind of the straw the broke the camel's back."

"How badly..." He trailed off and took a large swallow of his drink before continuing. "How badly were you injured?"

"I'll be fine." Reliving it every few nights was bad enough. She really, really didn't want to have to talk about it.

"Have you been to a doctor?"

"I said I'll be fine."

"You'll see one tomorrow. Do you need something to help you sleep?"

Buffy shook her head. She'd tried sleeping pills: they just made it harder to wake up from the nightmares. A terse nod acknowledged her decision. Wesley stared at her for several moments, obviously choosing his words carefully. She braced herself for whatever he had to say, fully expecting him to have changed his mind about helping her.

"It could take some time to find a permanent solution, Buffy. You'll be safe here while I try to find one, but I'll have to ask you to not leave the house unless I'm with you. We can collect your things in the morning."

She closed her eyes until she heard him leave the room. When she was sure she was alone, she huddled under the covers and stared at the ceiling. As far as ceilings went, it wasn't bad. Light grey, almost white, about five shades paler than the walls. She watched it until it started to turn pink from the sunrise, then let herself sleep until it was time to get the morning appointments out of the way.