“It’s a very long story.”

“Synopsize.”

“I had to kill a god.  In Hyde Park.  Some vampires helped me.”

Srina stared at him for such a long moment, he had no idea if she'd actually heard him or not.  Or believed him.  Perhaps it would be better if she didn’t. “You could have just said you got into a fight at the pub.”

“I got in a fight at the pub.”

She shook her head, putting her teacup down on the arm of her sofa. “You know, when I first met you, I thought you had the most fucked up life ever. How did it get more fucked up?”

He shrugged helplessly. “I ask myself that all the time.”

She crossed her arms across her chest and studied him, as if trying to figure him out. (Good luck.)  “Do a lot of gods hang out in Hyde Park?”

“Not that I know of.” He sighed, and ran a hand through his hair, finding blood in it.  Shit.

“Does this mean you’re heading back to the States?”

“No.” He tried to casually wipe his hand on the leg of his jeans - well, they were destined for the trash anyways.  “I still have some stuff to do here.  'Think, uh …”

“Think what?”

He’d started to say it before he honestly thought it through, so now he was pretty much damned to finish it. “Think I could stay here? I mean, while I’m in town?”

She gave him a sharp look, eyebrows knitting over her magenta eyes. “What the hell kind of question is that?” He was braced for her to chew him out.  He had no idea why she would, but he also knew women usually had a reason for doing so, or at least could find one.  But her expression softened, and she rested a hand on his chest, lips curved up in the barest hint of a smile. “Of course you can.  In fact, you’d better, or I’ll kick your arse.”

He smiled back at her, sliding his (non bloody) hand over her. “After a threat like that, how could I refuse?”

He leaned in to kiss her, and their lips barely brushed before she reared back almost violently, nose wrinkled in disgust. “Bloody hell, Logan. You smell like a slaughterhouse.”

That made him pause.  He supposed he did, but he’d gotten used to it quite a while back.  “Oh.  Mind if I borrow your shower?”

She pointed down the hall, toward her bathroom. “I’m insisting on it.”

“Fair enough.” He walked away, taking off his still clean shirt (well, it smelled fine - probably the only thing that did, but it must have counted for something) and balling it up in his hands.  He almost tossed it on the couch, but he didn’t know if she’d appreciate that.  At the threshold of the hall, he stopped and told her, “But this is good news, right?  If you can smell me, your cold’s gone.”

“You have five seconds before I throw something.”

“I’m going,” he sighed, turning away before she saw his smile.  Strange woman - man, had he missed her.

Maybe he had found a good reason to stay in London.

24

No one ever asked him, but if they did, Osiris knew he could voice several good reasons why there should be no new gods. This included the old gods being allowed to breed or split off or throw themselves into avatars or whatever it was they had to do to keep their tainted line going. Absolutely no new ones were needed, and in fact lots of the old ones needed to be disposed of anyways. And he knew several cases in point.

One arrived now, much as he expected. The remains of Camaxtli, harbored in the Human once known as Jean, appeared in a flare of light that was clumsy and unnecessary, but the newbies were always startlingly inept and inelegant. She materialized behind him, but he didn’t bother to turn. He waited for her to come around before he acknowledged her presence. She knew he knew she was there, and was deliberately ignoring her. It ticked her off, which made him mildly happy.

“Guess whose name just popped up on my book?” He said, tapping the pantheon of dead gods. (In spite of its size, and the need for a separate pedestal, there weren’t nearly enough pages filled.) He looked up at her to find her gaze somewhere between unaffected and annoyed.

“It was a bad idea in the first place,” she replied, with a dismissive wave of her hand. “She was unstable, and since she killed one of her own, she didn’t have many friends.”

“I was unaware this was a popularity contest. I thought we were just trying to get rid of Bob.”

“It wasn’t going to happen. We never found another god for Logan to avatar.”

He cocked his head and studied her flaming aura of barely contained energy that reached into the ultraviolet. Did Camaxtli really study his subject before making her an avatar? It was a very good bet he acted rashly, without thinking, and could now repent in leisure - well, if it was possible for the dispersed to repent. “I suggested someone. It seems he wasn’t good enough for you.”

She glared at him, lips parting slightly in what he took to be an expression of shock. It made anyone who used it look so completely idiotic. “Matuku? He’s a cannibal!”

“No - cannibals eat members of their own species. He eats Humans, who are of a lesser species.”

“But Logan’s a Human! You’d turn him into an avatar for a goddamn people eater?”

“Matuku is stronger than Bob.”

“Matuku is a mental case. He lives at the bottom of the Marianas Trench.”

“At least he lives in your dimension.” As she rolled her eyes and looked away, he told her what he knew she would reject, simply because it was the truth. “You don’t belong among us.”

She turned back sharply, her eyes narrowed. “What the hell does that mean?”

He slammed the book shut, but mostly for effect. “It means you’re still Human. You never had any intention of going through with this. As much as you dislike Bob, you still care for that creature down there. Which is he, I forget - the one you lust after, or the one you love?”

It was meant to get at her, and it did, proving his point. She was vulnerable to Human levels of feeling, which had no place here. Higher beings called for a higher level of awareness, of sensitivity, of consciousness, and she had none of it. She belonged back with the dregs, with the Humans - with Bob. “Do you really wish to anger me, Osiris?”

He gave her the same dismissive wave she had given him, and went to shelve a book of new dead. They were filling up at a rapid clip lately, and he couldn’t be more pleased. If she simply went back to the bipedal cesspit she crawled out of, he’d be elated. “I wish you’d go away, Jean Grey. Return to your people until you’re ready to ascend to the next level, if you ever are. Even Bob is more divine than you are, and I wish you knew how disappointing that is.”

He had anticipated her attack, the surge of irrational, Human anger that sent him slamming into his bookcase, that caused the books to swirl around him, caught in the tidal forces of a very small and targeted hurricane of crackling energy. Rage made her aura turn more of a Camaxtli red, but it just made her seem smaller by comparison. She would never even be half as great or formidable as him/her; she wasn’t even tangible enough to be a shadow. She was more like a fragment, an echo of a shadow blurred by time and erosion. Quite pathetic.

“Don’t you dare speak to me that way,” she roared, her anger echoed in the pulse of energy surrounding him. “And don’t you dare use Human as an insult! Just because I’m not the conscience free necrophiliac you are does not make me your lesser!”

In spite of the force pinning him to the shelf, he snarled at her, “You are Human, and that’s your problem. Have you ever wondered why there’s no half-breed gods, ones part Human and part other? Because physically your species is too weak, and your emotions and intellect are too frail. You cannot and will not see the bigger picture. You will not kill a thousand to save a world - you will not destroy a universe to save another. What Bob needs to be destroyed for - his failure as a higher being, his disgrace, and his fatal sentimentality - is what you see in yourself, Grey. And that’s why you won’t kill him, and while you‘ll be an even worse excuse for a higher being.”

He expected the hit, so he wasn’t surprised when it came, although he was surprised at its vicious force. He actually tasted blood in his mouth, felt it crawling down his face. (The feeling he didn’t like - but the taste did have a certain appeal.) It looked like her face was on fire now from all the waves of unstable energy rolling off of her, but it was shot through with the occasional flicker of black - the fear that he was right. (Of course he was - who was the actual god here?) “Don’t you ever compare me to him. Not ever! You don’t know me, and you don’t know what I was, or what I’ve become!”

He blinked the blood out of his eyes, not bothering to hide his disgust. “I am Osiris. I know everything I need to know about the beings who will join my library.”

“Don’t think Bob is the only one who could kill you, you pathetic little ghoul,” she threatened. “Maybe you’ll come back again and again, but it would be fun to see how often I could wipe you out before I got bored with it. I still have the power of Camaxtli - and you’re still nothing.”

She disappeared in a flare of light and energy, a consummate drama queen, the fabric of the universe ripping open and repairing itself after she had passed through, like she was a fatal anomaly. And she was, so that made sense.

With her absence, the books fell to the floor, and he was released, finally allowed to relax and wipe the blood off his face. The stupid little bitch. Precisely who did she think she was dealing with?

He was the offspring of Re, the king of the underworld, and the judger of the dead. Ultimately, whether people died or not was often thrown to him - if he rejected them, they were forced back. If he accepted them, they were his. There was no such thing as a time limit; if he wished, he could reject someone days after their death, weeks … years. The dead were his power and his people; the dead responded to him, because they could respond to no one else.

He had one of his vines pull a certain book off the shelf, and reach across to give it to him as he returned to the pedestal in the center of the room. “Nothing, am I?” He said angrily, rapidly flipping through the book. “I am Osiris; I am the King of the Dead. Which you, you stupid little halfling, are going to learn the hard way.”

Poor Jean Grey. She was going to get a lesson on just what a “nothing” could actually do.

25

The weather cooperated for the funeral, which was probably a minor miracle.

It was gray and overcast, but it didn’t rain more than simply mist, droplets so tiny and fine they got everything damp, but never fully committed to rain. It seemed very somber and appropriate.

Srina came with him, although she never knew Wesley; she wanted to be supportive, and figured spending a Saturday at a funeral had to be the worst thing ever. But Logan didn’t feel that way, not really. It would always be a terrible thing that Wes was dead, and while part of him didn’t quite believe it (he thought he could just pick up the phone and call him), another part of him was glad he was finally getting some peace. He didn’t know the details of Wesley’s life, but he got the impression that Wes was a haunted man, constantly trying to make up for something he had or hadn’t done, trying to live up to a standard that he knew was impossible, trying to know and anticipate everything in a world where that was simply beyond anyone’s reach.

The funeral home took care of the arrangements, meaning the invites, and Logan supposed that was best, as he knew nothing about how one invited people to funerals, or even who to notify - did Wesley have any living family? Friends? Were there enough Watchers alive to bother showing up?

Bob and Helga were waiting at the cemetery, a very well tended and elegant looking place, with high stone walls and wrought iron gates, some kind of Watcher cemetery, he supposed. Perhaps that explained why it seemed to take up several acres.

Bob told him that he and Helga weren’t visible to anyone else, because he figured a couple of demons might be slightly distracting among so many Humans. Logan wanted to comment, but couldn’t, as Srina didn’t see them either.

A little over a half dozen people showed up, not counting the four of them, and he found himself scanning for familiar faces among the sea of dark clothes and black umbrellas, although he had no idea why. He and Wes rarely hung out in the same social circles.

That’s why it stunned Logan to actually see a face he thought was familiar. An older man, probably early fifties but looking very good for it, the quintessential Brit with an open face and lines that made him look distinguished as opposed to aged, and small wire frame glasses that made him look like a university professor. Logan felt a shock of recognition, mostly for him but also for the jailbait blonde on his arm (considering she looked young enough to be his daughter, he hoped she was), but he couldn’t immediately recall where he’d seen either.

A man who looked like he was a Church of England deacon started the service as the last stragglers showed up, and Logan did his best not to stare at an older couple he thought might be Wesley’s parents. There was kind of resemblance, mostly on the woman’s part, and she seemed pretty broken up. The man, though - he got a bad feeling about the man. Maybe it was just a “stiff upper lip” stereotype he was cultivating, but he was scowling more than anything, glaring at the grave as though he expected Wesley to come back to life, crawl out, and start noshing on people’s brains.

About five minutes in, Logan remembered why he hated attending funerals. They started depressing, and yet became painfully boring, which made you feel guilty for wanting to ditch and get a beer somewhere. There was no way to win.

As the deacon said things that sounded like empty platitudes, Bob started singing quietly in the background, and Logan wondered if it was a comment on how boring it was all becoming, or just him being himself. “I hope you enjoy your stay in this next universe,” Bob sang quietly, heard by no one but Logan and Helga. “I hope this love is a silver screen that shows only silent films …”

Logan wondered how many funerals he had attended in his life and had forgotten. Jean’s was bad enough, but then, of course, she wasn’t really dead at all. And he hated himself for thinking - even just for one moment - that maybe she would have been better off if she had simply died.

(He never had a funeral for Leonie, had he? Shit. How could he do that? Maybe he was never a father to her, save for in a strictly biological sense, but that was the absolute least thing he could have done. Maybe Xavier made sure she wasn’t sent to a potter’s field or whatever it was they did with nameless corpses. Or did the Organization try and take her, since they had killed her in the first place? Rather than do something for her, he simply ran - and even that ultimately didn’t work, not the way it should have.)

Now he wondered if his desire to see Wesley get a proper burial was a case of transference, a belated desire to make amends for his failings. He had so many failings, and had known and lost so many people. Where did you start, and when did you stop? Did you ever stop? He knew the old adage about time healing all wounds was a lie; the best you could hope for was that the pain lessened to the point that you rarely noticed it anymore.

The deacon reached the end of his prepared remarks, and then asked, “Would somebody else like to say a few words?”

“Go on Logan,” Bob prompted. “Why don’t you say something and personalize this event?”

He looked at him in disbelief, and hissed, “I’m no speaker!” Immediately, he realized that no one else had heard Bob, and he must have looked like a complete nut, talking to himself.

But the deacon, an older man with snow white hair and the faintest hint of a Welsh accent, looked at him curiously. “But you’d like to say a few words anyways?”

Oh shit. Bob had set him up, hadn’t he? Fucking bastard. He gave Bob a dirty look before grimacing at the deacon and nodding. He went around the grave, coming around to where the deacon had been standing, and cleared his throat, giving the small crowd a cursory glance. Bob gave him a thumbs up, and it took all of Logan’s willpower not to give him the finger in response.

He really didn’t know what to say, nor was he sure that everyone here knew Wesley was a Watcher and what that meant. You could assume they did, but what if he was wrong? He looked down at the empty, yawning grave, and the gleaming beetle black coffin, and just started talking. “I didn’t know Wesley as well as the rest of you probably did, but he was bravest men I’ve ever met. He knew the odds against him were always staggering, but he still did what he had to do. Because, if he didn’t, who would? Someone had to stand up, and he did. He went out of his way to help me, and to help others who would never - ideally - have any idea who the hell he was, or why they would need his help. He never sought attention or reciprocation; he almost never asked for help, even when he probably should have. He had to know that every day he got up was potentially the day he would die - the odds were always stacked against him; he was just a man - but it never stopped him from doing it, neve! r stopped him from fighting. He died fighting the good fight, and the world will never know it … but it will miss him.” He cleared his throat again, feeling awkward and maybe a little embarrassed - what the fuck did he know about anything? He could barely string two sentences together.

He retreated to his previous position, beside Srina, and she twined her arm around his and leaned her head against his shoulder. “That was beautiful,” Bob told him. Logan thought the dirtiest curse words at him that he could, and tried to ignore the fact that he had actually made himself sad.

The service came to an end shortly after his little speech - he liked to think his clumsy elegy helped put the final nail in the theoretical coffin - and people started to drift away, as the rain started to come down in earnest. Srina still held on to his arm as they walked away, and she asked, with honest curiosity, “Are you okay?”

He nodded, still thinking about holding Leonie’s lifeless corpse in his arms, fragments of her brain congealing on his face. He really needed to call Xavier. “I’m okay. Just thinking about death.”

“What a happy -”

“Excuse me,” a man’s British - and familiar - voice interjected from behind them. “Could we have a word with you?”

Logan turned, and recognized the slightly owlish older man in the tweed suit he had noticed before, the one who was slightly familiar. Up close, his identity popped straight into his mind: Giles. Right, the Watcher turned vampire turned suicide bomber in the universe where he killed Spike. It was so weird to come face to face with someone you saw die violently. “Uh, sure,” he said, then glanced at Srina. “Meet you at the car?”

She frowned at him, aware she was being dismissed, but she clearly made the decision to give him hell about it later. Wow, it was like they were becoming a real couple or something. “Sure.” She gave Giles and his blonde girlfriend a skeptical glance, then kissed Logan on the cheek and started off towards the front gates.

She was a meter away before Giles asked, “You know Wesley from Los Angeles, yes?”

Logan nodded, wondering what this guy was leading up to - and why his little piece of tail was staring at him so intently.

“Were you there when ..?”

“No, I missed it, I was outta town.” Bob and Helga came up behind them, but of course they didn’t notice them - they were the invisible mourners. “Why?”

“Well, we were wondering if you knew -”

“What happened to Angel?” The girl suddenly interrupted. She was American, definitely Californian. “Will can’t find him with a locator spell. Is he … did he get killed?”

“Logan,” Bob said, crossing his arms over his chest. “Meet Buffy. This is one of those Slayers that’s been mentioned before. She’s also Angel’s ex - big long story there - but rest assured she’ll welcome any good news. And nothing you say will be considered weird to them. Trust me, they’ve been there, done that, and have the syndication rights.”

So not Giles’s trophy tail? That was kind of a relief; she seemed way too young for him. Logan looked between them, and wondered if there was a good way to put it, one that made sense. No, probably not. “No, he’s alive. He’s just in another dimension.”

She let out a small sigh of relief, and Giles asked, “Which one?” Like ‘How’s the weather’ , like it wasn’t the most fucked up thing in the world to say. Bob was right - there probably was no shocking them.

“A, uh -” Would Hell dimension go down well? Probably not. “- one controlled by a Senior Partner. Does that make sense?”

“The evil law firm thingies?” She asked. He nodded, and she looked up at Giles. “Does that narrow things down at all?”

Giles was forced to shrug. “Not … exactly. If they are the beings I believe them to be, they have a great deal of territory.”

“Poor Giles,” Helga commented. “Even in retirement, he doesn’t catch a break.” Hel then patted Logan on the back, and started walking off towards the gate. “Good luck, tiger.” So she and Bob knew him - them? Why not appear in front of them then?

“Is he trapped?” Buffy asked, looking at him almost expectantly. Did she want him to say yes, just so she could hit something?

“No. I think that was the intention, but last I saw, I think Angel managed to turn it around on them. I think he’s hunting them down in their own dimension.”

Giles looked at him with newfound curiosity. “Are you a psychic?”

“No, I just … uh, it’s a long story, but it involves psychic projection, I think.” Or wishful thinking, but he decided not to add that. “I’m not really … under normal circumstances, I can’t do it. So please don’t ask me to do it again, ‘cause I can’t.” Logan felt that spot between his shoulder blades start to itch. Someone was staring at him. He glanced around idly, but didn’t catch anyone doing it. Yet the itch remained.

“I don’t mean to be rude, but are you a demon?” Giles asked, straightening his droplet spattered glasses. He could have simply asked him, ‘Are you here on business?’ it was that casual. The world was fucking nuts.

“No, I’m a … I’m a mutant.”

“Oh.” That seemed to pique his curiosity. “Not one with psychic abilities?”

“No, purely physical.”

“Yeah, the muscles kinda give that one away, Hercules,” Buffy commented, jerking her head towards his arms. “Angel’s okay? You’re sure?”

He decided to keep lying. Once you already had, the sheer size of the lie didn’t seem to matter that much. Gnat sized or elephant, a lie was still a lie. “Yeah. He was kicking their ass. As soon as he finds a way back, I’m sure he’ll return.”

“I’d bet on that,” Giles agreed, looking down at the girl and giving her a tight, ironic smile. “It’s not like he hasn’t done it before.” Okay, what had he missed?

The girl sighed again, but nodded in acceptance. “He once said he was like a bad penny, always turning up. He‘d better too - I don‘t wanna have to kick his ass again.”

“It’s okay,” Bob said, and belatedly Logan realized he was putting a minor “whammy” on the pair of them. “No worries. Time to go now.”

“Well, it was nice meeting you,” Giles said, the epitome of upper class British manners. “I’m just sorry the circumstances were so … unfortunate.”

“Not as sorry as I am.” Who the fuck was staring at him?! Where the hell were they hiding?

“Wesley would have … well, I think he would have embarrassed by what you said, actually. But I can only hope that someone says such lovely things about me after I’m gone.”

“You’re not going anywhere buster,” Buffy said, a minor threat. “Remember the plan?”

“Which one?”

“We all die old in bed. And not the same one, no matter what Xander said.”

“Well, thank god for that,” Giles remarked, as the two of them walked away.

As soon as they were out of earshot, he turned to Bob, not sure if he should be angry or grateful. “Why’d you send them packing?”

“Who’s staring at you?” Bob replied, answering a question with a question. “I’m not seein’ anyone. Think it’s a threat?”

Logan looked around, brazenly this time, hoping to show his particular “watcher” that he knew they were there. But there was no reaction, no obvious sign of anyone turning away. “I dunno. You’d kinda hope no one would stage an attack at a funeral.”

“You would, but then again, who cares much for propriety nowadays? Even in England, it’s a rare thing. Direction?”

Logan closed his eyes, and tried to concentrate on the limited clues he was getting. It seemed especially hard now, as he was in no mood for this. His mind kept wandering to Leonie, to Wesley, to death and all the people he had failed. He wanted to get a good self-pity on; he didn’t want to have to assess threats.

He shut off his mind as best he could and let his instincts take over, the one damn thing in his life he could usually trust when everything else failed him. He pointed, unaware of the actual direction until he opened his eyes. His finger was aimed straight at a thick, gnarled oak tree a few meters away from the cemetery gates. Someone hiding behind the tree, or up in it? Its branches spread out wide, so heavy with leaves you couldn’t see the sky through its limbs, even when the wind came up.

“Stay here,” Bob said, and walked straight towards the tree. “You, show yourself now, and do it non-violently. You want no trouble here, and none with him.”

In spite of his “order”, Logan came over, getting really fucking pissed off that someone would try something at a fucking funeral. Didn’t demons have a single smidgen of respect for anything? And in a Watcher’s cemetery, of all things - wasn’t that playing deep in enemy territory anyways?

It was a humanoid figure that came out from behind the tree, and as Logan tried to storm past Bob, he reached out and grabbed his arm, holding him back. “I’m gettin’ a really weird energy pattern from this guy.”

Logan ripped his arm out of his grasp, and sniffed the air, picking up something new, beyond smell of graves and decay, living Humans and their smell, dirt and rain - it was … slightly Human, slightly familiar, and slightly electrical.  And ever so slightly dead.  It made Logan pause, more than a little confused. “Yeah, I know what you mean. He smells weird -”

Then the man emerged completely from behind the tree, hands loose at his side, an empty expression on his strangely ashen face. He was once again struck by that incomplete sense of déjà vu, that feeling he had seen him once a long time ago, but his mind wouldn’t instantly supply the identity.

But as he stared at the young man, he had a sudden flash of memory: he could see his facial expression contorting in shock as he ripped the rifle out of his hands…

Oh shit. Holy fucking shit.

“Logan?” Bob asked, obviously picking up on his sense of horror. But Logan couldn’t speak for the moment; he was honestly struck dumb.

He had done it then - he had taken the nanites and they had worked. And they had brought Cole Mullaney back from the dead.