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First of all: Happy Birthday Darkhavens! Secondly, I blame this fic on a number of cartoons, animes, and various comics. The two biggest culprits are the short lived Jaguar comics from the 90's, and a book called Uhura's Song by Janet Kagan. Just imagine everything from X-Men to Star Trek being thrown into my head and shaken together until this fic falls out. And of course it's going to be muli-chaptered because I am unable to write a PWP. |
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Cat Magic
by
Amejisuto
Part One
“What did you do, Willow?”
“Xander, that's not fair! It's not always Willow's fault when something weird and magical happens!”
Xander turned to Buffy and growled. “It is when Willow's standing there with a guilty look on her face!” He turned quickly to glare at Willow and she gave a little squeak. “WHAT DID YOU DO?!”
“It was just a little spell. It wasn't supposed to do...that. I mean, I've been worried. You haven't really dated anyone for over a year now – since Cordelia, really – and I just wanted to make it easier for you to meet girls.”
Willow looked like the six year old with her hand caught in the cookie jar that she used to be, big eyes and tears hovering on her eye lashes. That didn't touch Xander at the moment; he was just too angry. He also ignored Spike snickering in the doorway behind him. He'd settle with Spike later. Buffy was chuckling behind her hand and looking guilty too, so she'd been in on this as well.
“So you decide, for my own good and without my permission, that I need to date so you turn me into some sort of cat man?!! I look like a reject from a bad anime cartoon, or one of the fifth string X-Men! How the hell is that supposed to help me pick up women?!”
Xander couldn't believe it, couldn't believe that Willow would be so...manipulative. Well, yes he could but he thought he'd cut her off at the pass. He'd been gradually trying to get her to open her mind to the fact that he just might be gay, even talked to her about it once or twice! For her to go and put a spell on him was so uncalled for.
“Xander, it's not that bad. I mean...you look kind of cute!”
Spike all but doubled over laughing and Xander turned and hissed at him. “One more giggle out of you, Bleach Boy, and I'm using your duster as a cat scratcher!” Spike waved him away and Xander ignored him. He'd pay the vampire back later.
“CUTE!! Willow, my ears are almost on the top of my head. I have fur and claws. I HAVE A TAIL! A TAIL! I am not cute!”
Buffy snickered. “I wonder, if I scratch your tummy will you purr?” She then reached out and grabbed the tail that had been lashing behind Xander.
Xander felt his new ears flatten down to his head and he could hear a sort of coughing growl come out of his throat. His tail felt extra sensitive, and not in a good way at the moment since Buffy was yanking on it. Without even thinking he leaped at her, claws extended.
Before he could connect, though, someone had him by the neck and was shaking him. Xander stopped his attack, noticing how wide Buffy's eyes were. Still, he couldn't help but give another low coughing growl.
“Stop it, Harris!” Xander turned to look at Spike; he'd been the one keeping him from hurting Buffy. The vampire's true face was showing and for a moment Xander snarled back at him before even trying to stop. “Calm down, you git, before you cough up a furball!”
“Funny, Spike, real funny!” Despite his tone of voice, Xander didn't turn and claw at Spike. He couldn't help the way he was growling, or that his tail was lashing backwards and forwards or the way his shoulders hunched as if he was about to attack. He glared at Buffy. “Don't touch the tail!”
“I'm sorry, it's just so weird and I wanted to feel it...”
Xander snarled again, and Buffy put her hands up defensively. Willow's eyes were wide and she made a little eeping sound that Xander doubted he would have heard an hour ago. He swung around to look at her and she started to stammer.
“S—sorry, Xander, I'm so sorry! I know I can fix it, I just need a few ingredients...”
“Red, I think you've done quite enough. Come on, cat man, let's get you to the Watcher's.”
Xander allowed himself to be pulled out the door but still complained. “I can't believe you did this! Look at me, I'm a Thundercat!”
He continued to grumble all the way to Giles's apartment, with Spike walking in between him and the girls. The small part of Xander's brain that wasn't pissed off was glad; he didn't really want to hurt Buffy and Willow but he was seriously pissed off. No amount of brownies or cookies could make this go away, and not just because he doubted he could eat chocolate now.
As they walked in the courtyard to Giles's condo the girls pulled even further back. Spike looked at him and Xander could hear him whisper. “Best calm down a bit, luv, otherwise ol' Rupert might think he's under attack.”
Xander nodded and took a few deep breaths. It did help him stop growling to himself at least, and he could feel his hair lay down and his ears perk up. It was a very strange feeling, one he wasn't sure he could get used to. It was almost as if he was hypersensitive, especially under his clothes where his fur rubbed at the cloth. Then he pushed away the thought that he had fur because, really, that was weird and hopefully he wouldn't have it for long.
Xander couldn't do anything with his tail, and he was sure if he thought about that sentence too much his head would explode. Spike made a small move as if to tame it but stopped, probably thinking that Xander didn't want anyone touching his tail. Instead, Xander managed to bring it up and loop it around Spike's wrist twice, and got an amused glance for his efforts.
Xander just shrugged. The girls were going to find out about why he didn't need a girlfriend tonight anyway, so he might as well make himself happy, even if that did mean holding his lover's hand with his tail. He raised his hand and knocked on the door, and tried not to get fascinated with how his claws didn't seem that long at the moment but earlier had seemed long and razor sharp.
Then Xander realized he was looking at claws and started to freak out again. Spike gave his tail a small squeeze and it calmed him down. He could hear Giles move through the apartment and make his way to the door and grinned. If this new weirdness hadn't happened to him, he'd be bettting Spike about what Giles was going to say when he opened the door.
Xander made a small bet with himself as the door swung open. “Hey, Giles, I seem to be having a bit of a problem.”
Giles looked at him and blinked for a moment. “Oh, good lord!”
Xander bounced. He'd been right. Now he just had to hope that Giles could fix this. Otherwise, instead of Twinkies as a treat he was looking at a saucer of milk.
Part Two
Giles ran his hand through his hair. The glasses had come off halfway into Willow and Buffy's explanation. “And you don't know what might have gone wrong to achieve this result?”
Xander was pacing from the front door all the way into the small kitchen and back. He just couldn't seem to sit down; he was too agitated. After catching sight of his tail lashing behind him one too many times he had managed to concentrate enough to wrap it around his waist, which kept it out of the way. It felt odd, like he had twice as many nerve endings there as he did in the rest of his body.
Willow hmmed for a moment. “Well, I did add double the amount of catnip. It's for love and to enhance happiness. And then to protect Xander's heart I used pussy willow...”
“Pussy willow!! PUSSY WILLOW? For god's sake, Willow, you could have made my dick fall off!! I like my dick!”
Both Willow and Buffy flushed red and Giles had a sudden coughing fit. Which was a good thing since he could hear Spike telling him under his breath just how much he liked Xander's dick too and Xander had a sudden need to sit down and put a pillow in his lap.
“But...pussy willow is harmless. I mean, it's a powerful plant but it doesn't do...that!”
“How would you know? I mean, it's not like you've tried that spell before, is it? For all we know, pussy willow is a main ingredient in a spell for the transgendered and half the females you meet used to be women in men's bodies!”
“Children, please!” Giles raised his voice. “Can we please just ask what exactly you and Buffy wanted the spell to accomplish?”
Buffy and Willow did one of those silent communication things they did so well. Xander was pretty sure that females had some sort of telepathy that men just didn't understand. Not that he really wanted to anymore.
Finally, Willow spoke up. “Well, we were just worried—about Xander. I mean, he hasn't had a date for over a year. Anya stripped down naked in front of him and he didn't do anything.”
“I still don't believe that.”
Willow gave a halfhearted slap to Buffy to shut her up. “Hush. If Xander says he was a perfect gentleman I believe him. Besides, that's not the point. The point is that we...”
“It was your idea.” Buffy had her arms crossed and was pouting and Willow gave her a dirty look.
“You agreed!” A glare from Giles got Willow back on track. “We thought that maybe he just needed a little help. Not really a love spell because that didn't work that well the last time. Just a spell to make him more...open. So that women could see the Xander beneath the goofy exterior. Sort of like a magical cologne. It wasn't supposed to change anything, or transmute him, it was just supposed to enhance his good qualities so he could find a good girlfriend!”
Giles turned his glare onto Xander and Xander squirmed. “You realize that you are partially responsible for this, don't you?”
Xander fought the urge to smack himself in the head, or better yet to smack Spike. He'd always suspected Giles knew, both about him being gay and being with Spike, but this was the first time the Watcher gave any indication. “Yeah, I know. I just didn't know what else to do. I mean, I'm the only construction worker that doesn't make lewd comments when the ladies walk by. What bigger clue can there be, for me to jump up and do the YMCA?”
Giles sighed and put his glasses back on. “Xander, I have tweed suits that haven't been in the closet as long as you have.”
The girls were giving them both confused looks and Buffy raised her hand. “Can I say huh?”
Xander squared his shoulders. “The spell wouldn't have done any good anyway, since I'm gay.”
“What do you mean, you're gay?”
Spike was snickering in the corner and Xander made a mental note to make the vampire sleep on the couch that night. “As in attracted to males, not females. Remember how we had movie night the other week and we all agreed that Pierce Brosnan was the best looking Bond? I hate to tell you, but straight guys don't do stuff like that.”
Buffy tilted up her chin. “The enlightened ones do. Riley was there.”
Spike snorted. “Like he said, straight blokes don't do that sort of thing.”
“Riley is NOT gay!”
Xander laughed. “Yeah, which is why he's always looking at Spike's ass.”
“He is not! He just keeps an eye on Spike in case the chip goes off.”
“Okay, one: the chip is in Spike's head, not his ass. Two...”
Xander opened his mouth to point out that the chip had been fried but at Spike's glower shut his mouth. Maybe that little revelation would wait till later. For a high tech piece of government hardware it had been ridiculously easy to short it out. Once he was sure Spike wasn't going to go on any more killing rampages, he'd taken his lover to Walmart and run it across that thing that turned off the shoplifting chips in CD's and the like about ten or twelve times.
“How do you, you know, know?”
Willow's question confused him. “What? That Riley's gay? Come on, I bet he wears Victoria's Secret underneath that uniform of his.”
“No! That, well, that you're gay?”
Spike chose that moment to jump over the back of Giles's couch and sit beside him. “Well, could be the fact that Xan likes my dick up his arse. Then again, it could be his love of musicals. What do you think, pet?”
Xander groaned. That was his lover, always so helpful. “I think you're sleeping on the couch tonight, Fang.”
Part Three
Spike had his hand under Xander's shirt. Xander tried to ignore it and concentrate on the fifty questions both Buffy and Willow were asking him but Spike was scratching ever so slightly and running his fingers through the fur and it was driving Xander mad.
Too bad they weren't alone, then Xander could retaliate. As it was there was no way he dared do half the things he was tempted to do, but leave it to Spike to get his mind off worrying about the girls and onto sex. Well, foreplay in this instance.
“Xander you can't possibly be gay! I mean, you liked me! You were all jealous over Angel!”
“Uh, Willow can back me up, I also said he was handsome. And he is as long as you just look.” Spike was growling and Xander elbowed him. “Oh, shut up. You don't have any room to talk; you're the one who played bondage games with him!”
“That was over a hundred years ago, as you bloody well know!”
“WHAT?” Buffy was standing up, a shocked look on her face. For a moment Xander was afraid she'd be mad but all of a sudden she burst out laughing. “Oh, god! No wonder! That so explains his wardrobe. Straight men don't wear linen pants.”
Xander grinned and sighed in relief. Buffy was taking this much better than he expected.
Still, Willow was giving him odd looks. “Why couldn't you tell me? And why Spike?”
“Oi! Why not? I'm sexy. In fact I'm devilishly handsome, if I do say so myself!”
Spike was leering at the room in general and Xander thwapped him on the arm. “Yes, with the exception of your big fat head.” Xander chuckled at the look of feigned hurt that Spike put on, and tried to ignore the fact that his brand new tail was deciding to wrap itself around Spike's waist. Instead he turned to Willow.
“Wills, you're my best friend, you always have been, and I love you. You're like a sister. But sometimes, Willow, for all your book smarts your people skills are non-existent. Remember that lunch we had two weeks ago, and I talked about how much we'd all changed since high school, in just over a year? And about how you can discover new things about yourself?”
Willow was nodding all through the monologue so Xander continued. The dreaded Willow lip-quiver hadn't appeared yet. “And remember how I said how brave it was for that girl Tara to tell you she liked you, even though you weren't gay? And how much courage that must have taken her? And then I went into how hard it must be to come out to your friends and I wished I had that courage?”
Willow nodded again and Xander made a ‘there you go’ gesture with his hands.
She sat there for a moment and Xander and the others waited. And waited. Spike was snickering under his breath and Giles was looking more frustrated by the minute. Finally Willow's eyes got all wide. “OH!! So you were trying to tell me then that you were gay? Right?”
Giles snorted. “Yes, Willow, that's what he was trying to tell you.”
“Well, why couldn't you just come out and say it?”
Xander bristled at that, which was weird. He could actually feel fur moving. “And then you'd say I was possessed or something, and have Buffy tie me up and do spells on me. I was trying to avoid that, you know? Between having every female in town after me that one time in Junior Year and having the First Slayer traipse through my head this spring, I've had quite enough of the magic, thank you ever so much! If I even see a Magic Eight Ball I'm running the other way!”
Giles smirked at him, smirked! “Does this mean you no longer wish magical help to get rid of the ears?”
“NO!!” Giles and Spike both started laughing and Xander crossed his arms over his chest and grumbled. “No fair, no picking on the cat guy.”
“But....Spike?”
Willow sounded like she had the time Xander and Jesse had tried to get her to eat mud pies in first grade. As if he'd just done something totally gross and icky and she was going to make him pay for a month by forcing him to play Barbies.
There’d been a reason he'd stolen that damned thing.
“Yes, Spike. I know he's mostly evil...” there was some protest from Spike about the mostly part but everyone ignored him, “and, well, rude, sarcastic and annoying. But hey! I dated Cordy, so you can't be that shocked.”
“I take offense at the mostly evil!! I'm evil, right down to my black unbeating heart! Nearly ran over those brats at the grocer’s just the other day!”
“Spike, those kids were the most annoying ten year olds on this earth and were jumping out in front of people's shopping carts. You scared a year's worth of growth off them and everyone applauded. Then the manager gave us two T-bones in payment. That was not being evil.”
“It was! I could have...” Xander kicked Spike and his lover seemed to realize that he was about to give away the fact that the chip wasn't working. “Oh, never mind then. Love's bitch is all I'll ever be.”
Giles covered his mouth with his hand. “CoughcoughXander'sbitchcoughcough.”
“Hey!” Both he and Spike protested but Xander couldn't help but smirk just a little. It was kind of funny, and he'd learned from Cordelia how to manipulate a man. Well, usually he was on the manipulated end in that relationship and he didn't do it to Spike all the time, just enough so that Spike didn't try to rip out his friend's body parts.
“But...Spike?”
Xander rolled his eyes. “Yes, Spike. And don't go thinking that you can threaten him, either. No shovel talks. That goes for you too, Buffy.” He looked at them both, daring them to say anything. Normally he would never be this forceful with the girls. They were his best friends and their opinions were very important to him. That was one of the reasons he and Spike had been trying to keep their relationship quiet. Not really hiding but not being blatant about it.
This time, though, he was just too...something. Angry, hurt, impatient. Maybe it was the whole cat thing because Xander didn't think he was blended with some nice house cat. It was almost as if he felt more confident, or more aggressive, and he wasn't going to back down this time.
Spike must have sensed something was different as well. For a moment the scratching on his back stopped and then it started to move down lower. Xander sat back on his hand, trapping it. His neighbor had a cat and if you scratched his butt he'd stick it straight up in the air and Xander was so not going to do that in front of anyone but Spike. Heck, it was slightly weird thinking about doing it with Spike, what with the fur and tail and all.
The girls finally looked away and didn't say anything. There was this huge elephant in the room that was shaped like Angel but, thankfully, Buffy wasn't going to point that out.
Giles finally broke the uncomfortable silence. “Yes, well, perhaps Buffy should go out on patrol and, uh, kill things. Willow and I will go over the spell step by step and see what went wrong. Xander, you and Spike go...do whatever it is that you do that if I were to actually think about, would leave me blind.”
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