Xander Harris, elder Watcher over the west. Even looking out over a courtyard of two dozen student Slayers the man still didn't feel comfortable with the title.
It had been over a year and a half since the Slayers had been awoken. Since then, Buffy and Dawn had moved to Europe. Giles and Willow had tracked down every magic sensor and energy map they could find to try and identify the rest of the Slayers.
Oh yeah, and LA had been leveled by an army of demons. That evacuation had been quite literally hell to organize. But that was his job now. He Watched over the entire continent, seeking out apocalypses before they happened and overseeing the training of every new Slayer and champion as they came in.
He shook his head with a smile wondering how Buffy had ever gotten him to sign up for this.
Vi walked up to him with a cell phone to her ear, “Hey Xander, Willow wants to talk to you. There's some high school in silicon valley she wants you to look into.”
It had been almost two months since he and Willow had last talked. It was a shame she had a purpose for the call, but still better than silence he supposed.
Xander looked back, “Sure. Hand her over. Thanks Vi.” He took the phone and put it to his own ear with a growing smile, “Will, how's it going? Are you still under China or are you already in Sydney?”
The witch didn't seem to be hurried in her tone, which meant apocalypse was unlikely, which was good, “We actually finished the Sydney lead last week. Now Giles and I are in an old Watcher’s bunker in Sweden. There's apparently some kind of diviner for detecting demi-demonic dimensional domain dilation. Try saying that five times fast.”
Xander strolled inside and left the Slayers to their lesson, “You know me. I can't even say that twice. Is it gonna help us find hotspots or stop apocalypses or other magic-type stuff?”
He continued to listen as he wound his way towards his office, “Maybe all of the above once Giles gets it out of the box the Watchers locked it in. Anyway, you know how I've been keeping an Eye of Cerberus on spiritual curvatures ever since LA? Well, I picked up a major energy spike in California. Nothing apocalyptic, but I checked on it anyway and I found something you might want to look into. A picture of six teenagers and a dog at a school dance last year.”
The Watcher of the west heard his fax machine activate, “Oh no how will we ever survive this horrible twist of fate.” As the photo finished printing he saw what had caught Willow’s eye, “Does that girl have rainbow hair?”
“And wings, yeah. Three of them have wings and all of them have tails, as well as what look like equine ears instead of the human ones.”
Xander removed the photo and looked it over closer up, “Think they're demons?”
Willow responded, “If they are it's not any species I've seen reference to before. I asked Giles and he didn't know either. What's also odd is that other photos taken both before and after show them as normal human girls, which would suggest some kind of voluntary transformation. Do you see the other weird thing about all this?”
He nodded, “No one at the dance is freaking out about the girl with wings flying a meter off the ground. Either this is the third biggest case of mass denial and memory repression in history, or all the students know already.”
The fax machine started up again, “I'll send you everything I could find on the students and school. It's on the outskirts of a city called Canterlot.”
“Thanks Will. I've got an exam to do with Faith’s graduating victims in five, but I'll call you back after so we can catch up, kay?”
He could hear her smile, “Okay. Thanks Xander. It's great to hear from you. Bye.”
He hung up and pulled the new documents from the printer. The school apparently didn't keep a lot of digital records if this was all that Willow could find. A few of the students didn't even have last names listed. But damn these names were odd. Twilight Sparkle? Rainbow Dash? He couldn't imagine what sickness had motivated the Jack family to name their daughter Apple. More to the mystery he supposed.
He set down the documents and made his way back toward the courtyard where his duty to Watch teenage girls do flips and beat the crap out of each other was calling. Canterlot High would have to wait for another day.
Meanwhile, in silicon valley, a girl with pink hair felt a shiver run up her spine and frazzle her hair.
Rarity asked her friend next to her, “Pinkie darling, are you alright?”
Pinkie tapped her chin contemplatively, “I'm not sure. I just got the weirdest feeling like we're being watched. Like, more than usual.”
After a moment she shrugged, and continued her day with a smile.