You know what I should be doing right now, instead of giddily plotting this? SLEEPING.

One of the problems I've had with the few B/A cop AUs I've read is that Angel is always the cop, while Buffy tends to need rescuing or be a hooker with a heart of gold. I got my rant on a month or two back about how the essence of the characters needs to be the same for me to give a damn, and, after pondering the recent SGA discussions, I've come to the conclusion that I need the power dynamics to be the same, too.

All of this is to say that in my epic cop AU, they're partners.

Newly assigned Buffy and her sister have just moved to Sunnydale; after burning down a meth lab, Buffy was transferred out of LA for public relations purposes. Their mother runs an art gallery in LA. Buffy's a cop, obviously, and I think Dawn will be a teacher, although that might not be important. They live close to each other, but not together. Buffy meets Willow and Xander as randomly as she does on the show, and their friendship develops in the same manner.

Angelus Chase, who is Angel to his friends and oh-dear-god to his enemies, is recently a widower: Darla, his wife of five years, has just died (violently, in some manner beyond Angel's control - possibly murdered), and he's finding himself lost more and more. ("The man's a rock," Gunn says to Buffy her second day on the job, "but losin' his girl hit him where he lives.") His sister, Cordelia, is a mildly successful television actress in LA, and his first partner, Doyle, followed her out there.

Gunn, a friend of Angel's from the police academy, is partnered with Kate, who is trying to work through her daddy issues. Although Angel and Gunn are fast friends, their relationship was cemented after the murder of Gunn's baby sister: Angel was the only one who had believed him when he said that no way was Alonna involved in drugs, no way, and they had wrapped up the case in a forty-eight hour marathon of coffee and kicking in doors. Gunn's boyfriend Wes teaches Latin at the high school.

Faith, a former junkie Angel put on the straight and narrow, owns the local gym, where she teaches self-defense in addition to personal fitness. Every Sunday afternoon, Angel plays practice dummy/attacker for the crowd of women that seems to grow every time he visits. Faith teases him about his latent masochism. Fred is the coroner, I think, whom Angel saved from a couple of menacing cavemen his fourth month in Sunnydale; they're close, too. Lindsey is the station's lawyer - a union rep, I think is what they're called. (If not, blame Law & Order).

Someone should write this for me.