Sparring with Giles was hazardous. Buffy knew that training her was part of his job as her Watcher, and maybe it would have been okay if she’d been a potential Slayer rather than the real thing, but unlike the Slayer, Watchers didn’t have any special powers. No super strength, no inhumanly fast reflexes, no rapid healing or extra strong bones… Giles was just a regular human of her mom’s generation. Perhaps a bit fitter than most men his age, and with a pretty good grasp of self-defence techniques, but still easily damaged.

“I’m sorry!” Buffy hadn’t meant to hurt him, although under current circumstances she was sure that was no consolation to Giles. “I thought you were gonna block me!”

“I was,” Giles admitted, clutching the icepack to his eye. “But it would appear I wasn’t quite fast enough.”

It was probably lucky Giles’ glasses had already gotten knocked off by the time Buffy’s fist had connected with his eye, otherwise the damage might have been a lot worse, but even so, he was supposed to be her training instructor, not her punching bag.

“I’m a horrible person.” Buffy slumped into the nearest chair.

“It’s a black eye, Buffy; not my first, and almost certainly not my last. I made a mistake, and now I’m paying the price for my carelessness.”

“Your carelessness? How about mine? I might have killed you!”

“It was a glancing blow, I barely felt it.”

“No? You went down so hard I thought you’d leave a dent in the floor!”

“The only dent is to my ego.” Giles lowered the icepack from his bruised and swelling eye, smiling wryly. “I’ve been pushing you to be the best you can be while neglecting my own training. Perhaps it’s time I took a refresher course in self-defence.”


The End