fandomhighdorms | Fourth Floor Common Room, Friday Afternoon

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Fourth Floor Common Room, Friday Afternoon

Wes was having a... strange day. For one thing, he still had a few globs of pie filling in his hair from his Badass class earlier, and he was still annoyed at the way his Science of Deduction teacher had criticized his "tiny brain." So he retreated to the common room to decompress. Showering might have been a better choice, but sitting in the common room with a stack of books seemed more appealing. So he did.

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Kennedy caught the look and held both hands up, laughing. "Whoa, chill! It's just in case more people show up. It's kind of like a common room law of physics? Put food out, people show up. And leftovers are always awesome."

She set her phone down on the couch beside her and tucked her hands behind her head. "Eh, y'know. Two classes, running Reserves, whatever incredibly in-depth reading assignments Constance feels like throwing at me, and the training thing. Naturally. Thank god I still have some time for a social life. You, on the other hand... four classes?"

Was it a sign you'd been in Fandom too long when that seemed like an insane amount?

Oh, four classes were nothing compared to the schedules back at the Watchers' Academy. It was good for Kennedy she wasn't destined to be a Watcher instead of a Slayer, really. The social life would be out of the question. "Well, during the summer term, I only took two courses, and I was generally rather bored. So I decided to try to avoid that for this semester. I quite like my classes so far, particularly Ethics, although I thought I noticed that you didn't seem particularly fond of it yesterday."

Then the rest of what Kennedy said sunk in. "Your Watcher assigns you reading assignments?" he asked. "I never did that, and I don't believe Giles did, either. That's quite progressive of her."

"What, was I broadcasting Not a Fan or something? Because now I got saddled with being TA for it," Kennedy grumbled. Because the world apparently loved annoying her. ~~It was only fair.~~ "And the reading assignments are what I get for telling her how awesome it was I only have two classes a week, or something. God, how did I get the uptight Watcher?"

Someone was laughing about this somewhere. They had to be.

"I thought you looked a bit irritated by some of the other students' comments," said Wesley, and he was going to go ahead and take her grumbling about TAing as affirmation. "And having you do writing assignments is quite unconventional, I think. Giles never assigned Buffy and Faith extra work apart for their training. I occasionally made a few suggestions as far as studying was concerned, but they were routinely disregarded."

"She's out to get me," Kennedy declared. "I swear."

Or just try to keep her from asking so many questions all the time, for the love of God. That was more likely.

She gave Wesley an appraising look that, unfortunately, had a touch too much smugness in it. "What, they didn't listen to you?"

"I'm sure she just wants to protect you," he assured her in his typical Watcher-y lecture voice.

"No, actually, they seemed to have been trained by Mr. Giles to be oppositional and disrespectful, and very rarely complied with my instructions. And by the way, if you're looking to adopt some of their mannerisms, that would not be the one to take up."

Oh, Watcher-y lecture voice. That got a Pavlovian mild eyeroll from Kennedy. (Sorry, Wesley.)

"I dunno," she said slowly, half because she believed it and half because she liked to be a pain. "They both seemed pretty cool to me."

Well, the Slayer-y oppositional eyeroll got a Pavlovian sniff of disapproval from Wes.

"Well, cool, certainly, but I should hope you'd like to avoid turning evil and allowing a politician to ascend to demonic form and feed off a high school class," he deadpanned.

Aaaand another eyeroll. This could turn into a Pavlovian endless loop.

...but fun.

"Heard about that," Kennedy acknowledged. And you know, while it was somewhat admirable that she didn't actually say anything to the effect of Please, like I'd ever let that happen if it'd been me, it could've very easily been inferred from her tone. "Don't worry, that item's so not on my checklist."

"Hence my reccomendation that you not follow her behavior patterns," he concluded.

"That's interesting that you've heard of that, though. Do you know if all Potential Slayers are kept up to date on the events of the Hellmouth?" Because if he were Watcher to a Potential, no way would he tell her all the stuff going on there. Way too scary.

"We don't exactly have a weekly online chat or anything," Kennedy told him, and she couldn't help that touch of 'bitch, please' in her voice. "So I don't know what everybody else knows. It's just, I ask because I want to know, and I always get what I want, so."

...poor Constance.

There was that Watcher-y disapproving sniff again. "All right," he said awkwardly. "It, ah, it sounds like your Watcher has quite a task on her hands," he addwd, just the teeniest bit snarkily.

"I am a handful, it's true." Don't sound so proud of that, Kennedy. And then she had to ask. "God, do they teach you guys to do that sniff thing?"

"Only by example," he answered breezily. "Nearly all of the Watchers at the Academy do it, so it's impossible not to pick up the habit."

"Are all Slayers trained to roll their eyes whenever they wish to express dissatisfaction or superiority?" he countered.

"Well, Slayers, I wouldn't know," Kennedy muttered acerbically. "Not being one and all." Oooh, someone was still touchy about that. "Maybe it's just a natural reflexive reaction to uptightness."

Ooh. Burn.

"Right. Slip of the tongue, sorry," he blurted. "I just meant - right. Sorry."

Yeah, he could banter back and forth all evening and then all of a sudden he got skittish. Go figure.

"Yeah, yeah," Kennedy replied, trying to relax a little. "It's all good. Really. Since you're more used to dealing with them and all."

He rushed to explain: "Well, in classes and such, our instructors always say things to the effect of 'Your Slayer does so-and-so,' in scenario questions and such. We don't really say 'Potentials,' though of course those are the ones to whom the bulk of us are assigned. And," he added jokingly, "you do share the eyeroll."

Kennedy couldn't help cracking a wry grin. "Maybe that's how you figure out who we are, then. Maybe it's like part of the tradition."

"Very likely," Wes laughed. "Though if you'll believe it, it was brought to my attention that there was a Slayer several years ago who was actually polite. Respectful, even."

"I don't know," drawled Kennedy, falling into the rhythm of teasing; it wasn't quite like giving her Watcher a hard time for the fun of it, but it was kind of similar. "That doesn't sound like much fun."

Yeah, he'd heard she'd only survived a year after being Called as Slayer, but that didn't seem appropriate to joke about, for obvious reasons, so he didn't mention it.

The banter was fun, though. And surprisingly easy. He'd never managed banter with his actual Slayers - he was no Constance, after all - but it worked pretty well.

"I'm sure you would have been bored to tears," he laughed.

Yeah, no, that would be pretty depressing.

"And me bored is a bad thing," Kennedy warned him playfully. "Which is why I try and keep busy as much as possible. Hey-- you think you'd be up to training sometime? I mean, there's a lot of people here I can, but you know how it goes in our world."

Beat, then-- "You do know, right?"

She didn't mean to sound condescending; it just sort of happened sometimes.

"Yes, I do know," he shot back. Kind of lived there and all, of course he knew how it went on there. Then: "But... you want a fired Watcher to train you?" he asked skeptically.

Okay, that didn't actually make it sound so great, but...

"Sure, why the hell not?" Kennedy shrugged. "Can't waste what you know. That'd suck, and I'm always up for more practice. Come on, it'll be fun, right?"

Fourth Floor Common Room, Friday Afternoon

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