Work Text:
"So," Buffy said to the silence of the library, just to break it. Kendra looked up and Buffy realised belatedly that it would be viewed as a declaration of intention so speak and she probably should follow it up with something. She floundered. "Uh. So. Uh, where did you get Mr. Pointy?"
"It was given to me," Kendra replied, "by my Watcher. Is this important for the research?"
"No, just curious," said Buffy. She'd hoped a conversation would result. She should have known it wouldn't be that easy. Tapping her pen idly against the thick and incredibly boring book, Buffy sighed.
Kendra was still watching her. "He told me it was important. That I shouldn't let it go."
"Did he name it?" Buffy asked.
"I named it," Kendra said, and she sounded so proud of that that Buffy couldn't help but smile. Sure, some of that smile was a sort of disbelief that someone could be so thoroughly uncreative and yet talented at the same time, but most of it was just honest happiness.
It wasn't much of a conversation but it was more than Buffy had had in a few hours and more than she'd shared with Kendra since they met. Getting back to research didn't seem so difficult after that.
When Kendra spoke again a few minutes later, her voice had lost its determined, focused edge. She was speaking as a girl, not as a slayer. "He said that it was important," she explained quietly. "I had no friends, nothing to love. He said it was important that I learnt, so that the darkness in being a slayer doesn't take over."
Buffy raised her eyebrows and didn't hide her amusement (or her sudden affection) when she said, "So he gave you a stick."
"His methods can be unconventional," Kendra said, halfway between defensive and sheepish. "It is a very nice stick."
"The best," Buffy agreed.
Kendra smiled. It didn't seem faked in the slightest and the sight of it warmed Buffy's heart, piercing it as surely as a stake, though thankfully a lot less fatally. " You have a good heart alongside your warrior soul. I like you, Buffy. "
They were kind words that, to her horror, sent a blush into her cheeks. "Even more than you like Mr. Pointy?"
The stake lay conspicuously between them on the table and the two girls regarded it contemplatively. A beat passed and Kendra looked up. "No. Not yet."
"Then I'm gonna have to work on it," she said. "No way am I losing to a stick."
The researched seemed so much less dry and stuffy without the tension in the air.