Potemkin Village

by Mediancat

“You’re certain she’s up for this, Giles? So soon after what happened?” Quentin Travers mopped his brow; it was 85 degrees and 95% humidity in Sunnydale, California, even at night, but he insisted on wearing a full tweed jacket and long dress slacks. As a result, he was about ten minutes away from heat exhaustion.

“I’m sure,” Giles responded. Years of living in sweltering SoCal had taught Rupert Giles that attempting to maintain that air of decorum at all times was downright stupid, so he had on khakis and a short-sleeved pullover. “That legendary Slayer healing factor.”

“She fell well over a hundred feet into a cord of two-by-fours,” was Travers’ response. “I find it amazing that even a Slayer is able to get up and walk four weeks later, much less be in any shape to fight off a horde of vampires.”

Giles gave a small laugh. “Well, hordes, no,” he admitted. “But there’s been something of a decline in the local  troublemaker population of late. It sometimes seems as though the forces of evil need a break as much as we do. So far all we’ve encountered is a dozen vampires, an irritable demon, and a motorcycle gang too much into sorcery for its own good.” Then he paused. “Still, half of that has occurred in the last ten days or so, once the vampires saw Buffy wasn’t making her usual rounds.”

In the distance, Willow and Buffy rounded the corner of the graveyard. “What is the witch doing with her?” Travers asked.

“Well, Buffy hasn’t been at full strength, like you guessed,” Giles said. “One of us has gone with her every night since she recovered to help her. So far, it seems to be working.”

Wiping more sweat from his forehead, Travers said, “Well, let me be the judge of that.” Buffy was noticeably hobbling. Willow whispered something into her ear and she straightened. Turning to Giles, Travers said, “Are you sure they don’t know we’re here?”

“I haven’t told a one of them,” Giles said.

Right then two vampires emerged from underground, hungry and mindless as most newborns. Buffy spun in place, clearly favoring the leg, and lashed out with a fist at one of them.

The vampire easily dodged it and leapt on top of her, slapping her around. The other vampire went for Willow, but with a gesture from the witch the vamp went flying up about twenty feet. When he landed Willow made the same gesture, with the same result.

Meanwhile, Buffy was still having trouble with her opponent. The vampire hadn’t drawn any blood yet, but Buffy had yet to score a decisive blow.

On Willow’s third blast of telekineses, the vampire cracked his skull against a nearby tombstone and lay still. Willow turned her attention to Buffy’s opponent and all of a sudden the vampire froze in place. From there it was easy for Buffy to stake first that vampire, then the one lying over the tombstone. She was breathing quite heavily, though.

“Nice job, Buffy,” Willow said.

Breathing heavily, Buffy said, “Thanks. I couldn’t have done it with you, though.”

“How’s your leg?”

“It’s okay,” she said. “I can move on it.”

“I’ve seen quite enough,” Travers said. “Slayer! Come over here!” Buffy and Willow started at that, then looked up. Buffy’s eyes narrowed and she got a sour look on her face as she recognized Travers’ face

Giles hissed, “What on earth do you think you’re doing?”

“You invited me here to review her performance,” Travers said. “For the moment it is unsatisfactory.” Then he added, “My experiences here make me reluctant to intervene, but at the moment I fear I have no choice. At least until she recovers.” By this time Buffy and Willow had walked up.

“What the hell do you want?” Buffy said.

“I was observing you fight out there,” Travers said. “Not your best work.”

“I’ve lost a step,” Buffy said. “See how you are after slugging it out with a goddess and then falling a hundred feet.”

Travers nodded. “Understood. And this is not a reflection on you, but I honestly think we need to bring someone in here to cover the vicinity until you’re up to fighting trim.”

“I’m the Slayer,” Buffy said. “I have a healing factor.”

“So you should be up to full strength in another two or three weeks,” Traverssaid. “But look at you. You are limping badly and practically panting.”

“So are you!” Willow said.

Travers fixed a steely-eyed gaze on her. “Young lady, I am an out-of-shape sixty-year old man . . . apparently wearing far too many clothes for this place and time,” he added, noting Willow and Buffy’s shorts and t-shirts. “She is, however, the Slayer. A tussle with two newborn vampires shouldn’t even cause her to break a sweat.” Noticing no disagreement, Travers continued, “Therefore, I will be sending a Watcher’s Council strike team here for the duration of your recuperation. Don’t worry,” he said, “Your pet vampire will be off the menu. We simply feel it best not to leave the Hellmouth unguarded for that great a time.”

Buffy snorted. “I still can’t believe you’d be spying on me –“

A look of reluctance on his face, Giles said, “Actually, I sent for them.”

Buffy and Willow spun and glared at Giles. “What?” they said at the same time.

“I’m quite sorry,” Giles said. “But I wanted to make certain my judgment wasn’t clouded. In watching your work, Buffy, I have to agree with Mr. Travers – this is far from your best work.”

Now it was Travers’ turn to look surprised. “You’re agreeing with me?”

“Don’t get me wrong,” Giles said. “I still don’t like you. But it would be damned immature of me to argue with you just for the sake of argument. However, I have a request.”

Ignoring Buffy’s whimpers of protests, Travers said, “And that is?”

“Do you know what a Potemkin Village is?”

Travers blinked, then shook his head no. “I’ve heard of it, but my formal education was so long ago –“

“Well then,” Giles said. “There was once a Field Marshal of Imperial Russia named Grigori Potemkin. He was one of Catherine the Great’s closest advisors –“ At Willow’s startled look, he said, “Not THAT one. In any event, one of Potemkin’s duties was to convince Catherine that the country was in splendid shape and that the populace loved her. So on tours of Russia he would arrange for whole fake villages to be set up, complete with false-front buildings and mobs forced to cheer at swordspoint, and these did the job of convincing Catherine that all was indeed well in her empire.”

“Thanks for the history lesson, Giles, but what relevance does it have?”

“I don’t care how talented your strike force is,” Giles said, “If the vampires see the Slayer out of commission for too long they’ll be more active – as, indeed, will everything else that the Hellmouth attracts. Her, they recognize. You –“

“I see your point,” Travers said. “You want her to still seem to be doing most of the killing. A Potemkin Village for the vampires.”

“Precisely,” Giles said.

“I don’t see a problem with that,” Travers said. “Provided you’re up to it, Miss Summers?” Buffy’s sneer was all the answer he got. “I’ll take that as a sign that you’ll go along with it. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I really must get back and call the Council.”

“Translated,” Willow said, “You want to get back to your air-conditioned car.”

“Precisely,” Travers said, bowing slightly. “Giles. Ladies.” And then he walked away.

The three watched him until the car drove off. Then Buffy looked up and said, “How’d I do, how’d I do?”

“You – you did fine,” Giles said wearily. “Now please, go back home. Do what Dawn says.”

“Okay!” And the Buffy-bot moved chipperly away.

“I can barely stand to be near her,” Giles said. “I don’t know how Dawn can –“

“Dawn’s a lot tougher than she sometimes seems, Giles,” Willow said. “She fends for herself as much as she can; the robot’s only used for when she needs adult representation. And now we have professionals here patrolling while we work on improving it as much as we can. Spike’s gone back to track the guy down who originally created her to see what we can do making her a better fighter.”

“These are all only temporary solutions, you know,” Giles said.

“I know,” Willow sighed. “But the important thing is Dawn’s not being ripped out of her home, and we’ll have someone here who can fight off the vampires until we do manage to improve the robot.”

Giles paused thoughtfully. “Willow,” he said. “Do you remember what I was telling Quentin Travers about the concept of the Potemkin Village?

“Yes – and I DID understand the Catherine the Great reference, it just surprised me –“

“I know,” Giles said. “And that was not my concern in any event. The thing is, we just pulled off a Potemkin Village on Travers as well.”

“How?”

“By convincing him Buffy’s still alive,” Giles said heavily. “Because if they knew she was dead –“

Willow was confused. “Won’t a new Slayer have been called anyway?”

A figure stepped out of the shadows. Angel? “How’d it go?” he asked Giles.

“They were fooled,” Giles said. “They still think Buffy’s alive.”

“Good,” Angel said. “I’d hate to have to kill members of their assassination squad. Because I would, you know.”

Willow said, “I’m still confused. What’s this about an assassination squad? Who would they be killing –“ the realization hit her like a sledgehammer. She turned on Giles. “This was never about protecting Sunnydale at all, was it?”

“That was a nice fringe benefit,” Giles said. “But the main reason was to stop them from hastening the line of succession. Because Buffy – Buffy died once already, so her death did not call a new Slayer.”

“So this entire thing –“ Willow stopped, speechless.

Angel finished her sentence. “This entire thing was all to stop the Watcher’s Council from trying to kill Faith.”

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