There's Something About Buffy

Summary: *2010 Halloween fic/companion to 'There's Something About Parker'* What did Buffy do with the skills she learned dressed as Parker on Halloween? WARNING: Character deaths.

Warning: I don't know; maybe language and innuendo somewhere along the way.

Timeline: starts in season 2 BtVS 'Halloween'. This part is during 'Innocence'.

Challenge: just a follow-up for last Halloween's fic, 'There's Something About Parker'.

A/N: Ending the 2010 Halloween fic series with a follow-up from last year. Hope you enjoy it.

Thanks to my betas: zigpal, AerynSpeedleCaine and AshDawnSoulmates.

Disclaimer: BtVS characters belong to Joss Whedon / Mutant Enemy. Leverage characters belong to John Rogers, Chris Downey and TNT. I claim no rights to any copyrighted material. Please do not copy or take this story without my permission.

Angel's apartment

Just after Angel ran out…

Buffy looked around for Angel when she felt something wake her up. When she didn't find him in the apartment, she decided to pull a Parker. Okay, so it was a bit risky, and Giles probably wouldn't be happy with her for doing this on her own, but it was her job to protect the innocent, right?

She quickly got dressed and snuck out, moving through the alley behind Angel's place. In her haste, she almost ran right past the dead woman laying there. It shouldn't surprise her that somebody in an alley was killed by a vamp, but so close to Angel's? Was that why he was missing? He heard the attack and chased after the vampire?

Worrying about Angel would have to wait until after the Judge was toast. Right now she had to go home and gather some of her special equipment from Halloween. Parker may have been socially inept, but she was a maestro – is that the right term for a woman master? – when it came to B&E with a healthy interest in explosives.

After a couple stops to make sure she was prepared, Buffy made her way to the factory. She had been practicing since Halloween to be certain she was as good at this as Parker was. If she wasn't, she was darn close. Avoiding the areas that she heard movement in, Buffy managed to place charges at all the structure point in the building to ensure that it would be a massive pile of rubble.

But Buffy couldn't detonate until later, preferably during the daytime, so the vamps couldn't escape. She'd check for sewer access besides the one she and Angel escaped in the night before. Those would be treated to special explosives that had holy objects in them if the access hatches were opened. If the explosion didn't kill them, maybe the holy shrapnel would. When the time came, she'd return with one last surprise for the Judge. It might not kill him, but hopefully it would slow him down long enough for them to find something that would.

Factory

Right after school let out…

Hanging from her harness, Buffy looked down at the Judge, Spike and Drusilla. She grinned maliciously. This was better than she could have hoped for. She reached into her bag and pulled out three volleyballs – or at least they looked like regular volleyballs. Inside, however, was an entirely different story. At the core, there was a ball of plastique in a watertight casing. Surrounding that was holy water.

"Hey bad guys! Catch!" she yelled, throwing a ball to each of them.

Spike arched that irritating eyebrow of his. "That's your big plan, Slayer? Knock us out with sporting equipment? And to think you had Angelus sniffing after you all this time. It obviously wasn't because of your intellect."

"His name's Angel now," Buffy snapped, getting ready to hoist herself out so she could detonate.

The bleached menace simply grinned back at her. So he promised to give Angelus the night to mess with her; didn't mean he couldn't mess with her too, did it? "Not anymore, pet. He's back on our team now."

Buffy felt her heart constrict with pain. She had to go find him right away; make sure Spike was just lying to upset her. But there was one thing left to do before she left. She gave him her own evil grin and quipped, "Sorry, you don't have a team anymore." At the same time she hit her harness retraction, she pushed the detonator for the volleyballs.

It was rather satisfying to see the two vampires dust as their bodies were caught in the explosion. Even better, the Judge's body was torn apart as well. Just to be safe, Buffy prepared the second detonator for the charges she placed earlier. As she pressed the button, she saw Angel run into the area where the Judge was.

'Oh god!' she thought. 'I've killed Angel!'

Despite her broken heart, Buffy knew that she had to get out of the factory – if only to tell the others that the Judge was incapacitated for the time being. Somehow, she dragged herself to the library where she knew they were researching him.

Behind her, the perfectly placed explosives destroyed the factory and collapsed on itself. Very little damage was done to the buildings nearby. Something to thank Parker for. That 20 pounds of crazy in a 5 pound bag of Parker sure came in handy at times like this.

Library

When she stumbled through the doors, she heard Willow greet her, "Buffy!"

At the same time, Cordy wrinkled her nose in disgust and asked, "Why are you in that outfit?"

Giles ignored both girls and inquired, "Did you locate Angel yet?" With Giles' question, Buffy broke down in tears.

"See, Cordy…your constant putdowns finally made the Buffster snap. Words hurt," Xander chided glibly, worried about his best friend and hoping a little levity would ease the tension in the room.

Willow was at the blonde's side first, and she pulled her into a hug. "Buffy? What's wrong?"

Through her sobs, Buffy managed to gasp out, "I killed Angel. Or he might have been Angelus… I'm not sure."

Pulling his glasses off, Giles glared at them before laying them on the counter. Instead polishing them like he normally would, he asked his Slayer, "What are you talking about?"

"I went back to the factory to kill the Judge and all the vampires there-" she started to explain.

"I thought I told you not to go off half-cocked!" Giles interrupted angrily. It was very foolish and dangerous for her to go after them on her own, and the thought of losing her made him sick to his stomach. Once in a lifetime was enough to live through that pain.

Buffy continued like he didn't say anything, "And just as I pressed the button to set off the plastique, I saw Angel run into the middle of the factory. What I don't understand is Spike claimed he was Angelus again."

Jenny knew it was time for her secret to come out – even if it cost her Rupert and her young friends. "According to my uncle, he was," she said quietly.

Turning to the woman he was growing to care for, Giles demanded, "Who's your uncle, and why would he know?"

She took a deep breath to calm herself. Then Jenny confessed, "My name is really Janna Kalderash, and I'm from the clan of gypsies that cursed Angelus a hundred years ago. I was sent to Sunnydale to make sure that he was still suffering for his crimes."

"You used us to get close to him," Willow accused, tears welling up in her eyes. This was her favorite teacher, and she betrayed them!

Jenny's heart broke at the hurt in Willow's eyes. "I had no idea that you knew him until that night with the Master rising. I'm sorry that I didn't tell you sooner, but my family forbade me from telling anyone my true identity," she tried to explain.

Buffy cut in bitterly, "At least one of us is good at being Secret Identity Girl. Did you know? That he could become Angelus again?" she asked, her eyes threatening bodily harm if the answer wasn't the right one.

Shaking her head, the technopagan said, "My uncle only told me a little while ago. The only thing he said to me before I came here was to watch him and to keep you two apart. I didn't know why until now. You made him happy, perfectly content," she told the heartbroken Slayer, her eyes explaining she knew how that happened. Buffy's stomach rolled with the confirmation.

Clueless, Xander asked, "What's wrong with that?"

Jenny knew this was the part they wouldn't understand. Hell, she was a gypsy and she didn't fully understand it. "It's a failsafe built into the curse. My people didn't want him to ever know peace, so when it did, his soul was taken away again, leaving only the demon behind."

"Well, that's a stupid plan," Cordy scoffed. "Then we're left with a vicious vampire again. Couldn't the failsafe be something like an automatic dusting or something?"

Knowing that her forgiveness with anyone in the room had to start with the Slayer, Jenny turned back to her and said, "I'm so sorry, Buffy. If they had told me about the failsafe, I swear to you that I would have told you before. I honestly thought they just wanted to make sure he still suffered."

Buffy's eyes narrowed dangerously, seeming to bore right through to Jenny's soul. "Do you really mean that?"

"I do," Jenny vowed. She lowered her head in shame for a second, then looked up again helplessly. "I don't know how to make you believe me, but I do."

"Tell me where to find your uncle," the Slayer commanded after thinking about it for a moment. "If he confirms what you said about not telling you before, I'll think about it."

Giles got a call from Buffy later, telling him that Miss Calendar was telling the truth. She also said that she was leaving Sunnydale after she got the pieces of the Judge out of the rubble of the factory. She needed some time to get over this. Besides, she was supposed to go to her dad's to celebrate her birthday anyway; she'd just move it up a weekend.

"Don't worry about that. As soon as the fire department clears the area, we'll go in and retrieve the pieces," Giles promised his Slayer. "All we need to do is get a few larger ones to ensure he can't be reassembled. Those parts will be sent to different parts of the world like before."

"Maybe one of those places should be an active volcano," Buffy suggested.

"Go to your father's and grieve for Angel," her Watcher ordered gently. "It may not help, but try to think of it this way: at least his soul is at peace now."

A/N: Hope that satisfies the people who wanted Buffy's side of the Parker switch. Happy Halloween, all!