Somebody in the Angel thread yesterday said they hoped "Xander's in Africa" would spawn some fic. I woke up with this vignette in my head. And I don't have time for new stories, darn it.

Jacob Malone, worried father, stared at the man who might be his last hope. The doctors at the Nairobi hospitals all said there was nothing wrong with Natalie, nothing physical. His sixteen-year-old daughter seemed normal as ever, and she was upset that the situation had disturbed the family's world. People were beginning to talk. Malone's job with the Kenyan government always teetered on the brink of "native jobs for native people" catastrophe, but he had grown up in Africa. He himself would have been born in Nairobi except for his father's demands that no child of his would be born in a--well, best just to say that Gregory Malone's retirement back to England had been a welcome event on all sides.

"Mr. Vorsana, you say you can help my daughter? It's been months now, and no one has been able to do anything. My Nat's a good girl, she doesn't want to be like this, but . . ."

The Eastern European expatriate sitting across from him in the market cafe stirred his coffee and nodded. "But she still insists that there are monsters."

Malone sighed. "Yes. She panics about being out at night, and she won't let any of us out of the house without crosses and such. I know the incident with the lorry door was an accident, but she put her fist through it without even trying. Marie, my wife, is frightened."

Vorsana nodded. "Any mother would be, if she suspected her daughter was . . ."

Malone clenched his hands together. "Natalie's gone mad, hasn't she."

Vorsana was taking a breath to answer when a voice behind him spoke. "No, Mr. Malone, she hasn't. Natalie's probably more sane than a lot of people."

The new arrival, American by the accent, was a young man in dusty khakis, with sun-darkened skin, unruly dark hair curling out from under a worn broad-brimmed hat, an eyepatch, and a good smile. Vorsana curled his lip.

"Harris. The last I heard of you, you were out in the Serengeti with those wildlife researchers. Hyena hunting territories, wasn't it?"

The smile became more sardonic as the new arrival played with the broken fang that hung from the fetish bead necklace he wore.. "Yes, it was. But something told me to get back to town. By the way, Rupert Giles says hello."

Malone saw Vorsana flinch. "Mr. Vorsana, who is this?"

"Mr. Malone, this is Xander Harris. The more provincial of the local folk call him The One Who Sees."

Harris looked uncomfortable. "It's not like I asked them to."

Malone studied the new arrival. The young man seemed friendly enough and less mysterious than Vorsana. "What is it that you see, Mr. Harris?"

Harris' voice became weary, and his mouth tightened with some painful knowledge. "I see the monsters, too, Mr. Malone. I know they're real. Your daughter is not mad. Life might be simpler for all of us if she was. Then we could all pretend none of it is real."

Harris looked uncomfortable. "It's not like I asked them to."

I love this. Great fic.

Hee. Yes, that's a great line, and very Xander.

Today's Open on Sunday challenge is a weirdie - dictionary.com's words for your birthday, use as both title and in the drabble. So.

Anodyne

Angel curled on the bed, shivering.

He never saw the arrow Faith hit him with. He hadn't needed to; the fast leak of whatever nameless toxin she'd smeared it with through his system told him what was what. Curable, yes - with the blood of a Slayer.

Not a problem, she'd told him, and gone out into the night, to hunt for Faith. She'd come back empty-handed, but with a cure nonetheless. My blood, she'd insisted, take it. She beat him down, forcing the issue.

As she spasmed, orgasming beneath him, he understood what she was to him: his ultimate anodyne.

Second birthday word (from my birthday in 2000, I think):

Peremptory

So many things she remembers of Tara.

She remembers sensitivity, a skin so thin an eggshell seemed tough in comparison. A full, almost babyish lower lip, that would want to quiver at a perceived unkindness.

She remembers humour, sidelong glances over someone else's head, sharing a joke in silence that would leave them both laughing in the privacy of their bed long after the joke was gone.

Most vividly, though, she remembers passion, the only time Tara ever showed force rather than strength: the peremptory pressure of her lips to Willow's own, an end to conversation, a command to love.

(Nice, Deb, the both of them.)

I only wrote one.

Turpitude

For as long as he can recall, he has tried to mold himself to the expectations of others. A dutiful son, an attentive student, a loyal employee, first to the Council, then to Angel.

Cast in the role of betrayer, he struggles to find his lines. Judas, she whispers with a smile from just beyond the curtain. Not so pure, not so loyal, not so good as to resist everything she offers. In his bed, he lets her teach him. It's just another template: turpitude instead of rectitude, vice instead of virtue.

Just another set of expectations to be met.

Judas, she whispers with a smile from just beyond the curtain.

oh, YUM.

I like that in your second one, Deb, I got such a tactile sense of Tara, like if I touched the words on my screen, I'd hit warm and fragile flesh.

I was looking over all the words, and grumping because one of my favourite words - portend - wasn't for my birthday. And the person who used it wrote a pretty fic, but used it as a NOUN.