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straightened his shoulders and stood taller, losing his slumped posture. His footsteps became more
firm and beat out a steady tattoo on the sidewalk.
Chapter 5: Companions 3
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Disclaimer: all characters belong to their original creators. I am making no profit from them. All
original characters are mine. Any resemblance to persons living or deceased is purely coincidental. No
harm is intended to any person real, created, living, deceased, or any financial/corporate entity by the
publication of this story. It is a fiction, therefore a product of my imagination only and should not be
construed as a reflection on the character, personality, sexual preferences or religious beliefs of any
real person or place, living or deceased, actual or created.
Thoughts are indicated by /.
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That night had been the beginning of an exhilarating friendship. Tomas and Sinjin treated him like a
long lost brother, claiming the lion’s share of his time. They began broadening his horizons almost
immediately.
He had been introduced to the demon community and found that most of them were just like anyone
else. They worked and paid the mortgage and reared kids. Normal everyday stuff. His boss, Rusaka, at
Sanctuarie was a demon, a Tsanugara demon. They were peaceful and law abiding and tended to own
clubs and hotels; real party demons they were. It was a relief to know someone else that knew about
demons and vamps, and magic and mayhem, so he didn’t need to hide that part of his life from them.
Jeez if the Scoobies only knew. He shook his head.
Who, are you kidding? They’d come crashing in and kill everything in sight. Tolerance is not one of
Buffy’s personality traits .
Through the influence of Tomas and Sinjin he had come to realize and accept that he was attracted to
males as much as or more than females. Though he hadn’t acted on that particular personal revelation
yet. The realization had happened so gradually and naturally, that it hadn’t freaked him, or them, out at
all.
He had discussed it with both of them sitting around a crackling fire on one of their camping trips,
while passing a bottle of JD around and roasting marshmallows. They had looked at one another and
had told him to love the person not the package, whether it was demon or human, male or female. He
thought about that often and it soothed him when he tended to panic over his changing self.
Both the brothers were highly empathetic and they made change easy and accepted everything about
him unconditionally. Neither of them expected him to be anything other than exactly what he was or
what he wanted to be. In fact they were quite willing to help him do or become anything he wanted, in
any way he needed it.
All this summer they had done things that Xander had never done in his life. They had taught him to
ride a motorcycle and the three of them had been riding the country like a trio of gypsies. They had
gone camping and club hopping in LA. They had dragged him shopping over his vociferous
complaints.
They had revamped his admittedly dismal wardrobe, without embarrassing him at all. The brothers
delighted in dressing him in leather and silk, tight jeans and shirts that clung like a second skin, with
not an eye popping color in sight. Most of his new clothes were at their place since he had spent the
majority of his time there this summer.
With the girls and Giles seeming to become more distant as time marched on, and disappearing for the
summer, he had grabbed onto them desperately, like a drowning man. They accepted his pathetic
neediness and lavished brotherly affection and attention on him. He’d never experienced anything like
it. When he took time to consider the dynamic between the three of them, it felt like what family