Layla Smith/History

*Do not read beyond **this point** if you want to avoid being **spoiled!***

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## The American Girl

Arriving in Little Rosewater, Layla became the catalyst for all of the shenanigans that would occur in the ensuing weeks. After a rather difficult period of settling in, including being assigned to dorm 13, where most of the space was occupied the effects of the previously-only occupant Imogen Parker, Layla found out that her biology teacher, Mr. Edward Miller, was in fact her Watcher. She was enlisted to join him on a patrol that night. She somewhat-failed to sneak out, having been spotted by the students she was working with in the class - Imogen Parker, Barnaby and Robert. Later, the others pursued her and Mr. Miller to the graveyard, where after some initial conflict and allegations of "bonking", the nascent group began to form.

Having already impressed Mr. Miller by surprise-tripping him and holding a stake to his heart, Layla showed her skills to the others by the night's end, arriving to save Imogen, Barnaby and Robert from their former schoolmate and now-vampire, Craig, by sliding across the ground and staking him in the heart. After strongly convincing Barnaby that she and Mr. Miller were not bonking by holding him up with one hand, the group departed, having been informed by Mr. Miller after Craig's dusting about the reality of their situation and Layla's role.

The next day saw the group formed for good, with the four patrolling that night alone while Mr. Miller was supervising detention. With a quiet patrol, Layla led the group to the school's basement. After encountering an ambiguous Mr. Penrose, Layla led the four against a group of demons performing a ritual on a student in the basement. Layla opened the fight by a surprise lethal attack to one's heart, followed by an attack to another that would become the first of what would become a trademark of Layla's fighting style: a flying jump-kick to the groin. In the fight Layla would account for the majority of the slain demons. The student would turn out to be James, and the ritual one intended to open the Hellmouth under the school.

The following day, Layla and the group discovered the biology lab cordoned off with police tape, with signs of a struggle. Following a failed attempt to find traces of Mr. Miller at his house in Little Rosewater, Layla's exceptional senses allowed her to hear Imogen's screams as she was being kidnapped by a group of vampires, and to pursue them to an abandoned building at the edge of the school grounds.

In the ensuing fight against a vampired Mr. Miller, Layla opened with two attacks that should have killed an ordinary vampire. The first, a throw, was intercepted by Miller, but the second, an attack to the heart with a stake that should have killed him, only stopped by a hardened steel breastplate which nonetheless caved under the Slayer's onslaught. An opportunity to exploit this to kill the vampire Miller for good was not granted when he attempted to collapse the building. Similar to how Alexander the Great abandoned the opportunity to capture Darius III at Gaugamela to save Parmenion, Layla gave up the opportunity to kill Miller to save the still-bound Imogen from the falling debris. The consolation prize was the death of the surviving vampires, formerly students, who were knocked down by Layla throwing the beam at them, and easily finished off.

After St. Thom Huell's victory over Greater Rosewater Comprehensive in a rugby match, Layla was involved in rescuing Barnaby after he tried to head off Ned and Brian Phillips, who had turned into trolls. Prior to this, she had been involved in a break-in of Mr. Woodbridge's office, where the circumstances of the rugby team's new sponsors, in particular Phillips Gardening Consortium, were discovered, leading to suspicions about the new jerseys and energy drinks provided. Though Robert and Imogen would do the majority of the work figuring out the danger an unknowing Barnaby was in, Layla contributed in the end by drawing the twins' attention in the fight and wounding them, so that Robert and Imogen could cut off their jerseys.

Layla did not attend the Brain Olympics in London, having not been selected for the STH quiz team due to her relatively low knowledge scores.

After visiting *The Basement* nightclub, Layla engaged in a first, and managed to kill or wound a number of vampires using her wood-sheathed stiletto heels with as much efficacy as she would with an ordinary stake. The shoes were ultimately destroyed to kill the vampire biker boss, and Robert was enlisted to design a pair of strengthened footwear for this purpose. It is not known how far along he is in this process. During the Unending Night incident, Layla also managed to perform an extraordinary stunt, running down a chain suspended between a moving bus and a motorbike, killing the rider with the shoe and taking control of the vehicle. She also managed a number of other kills while on the motorbike, though she was eventually dismounted. This was remarkable considering her complete lack of driving experience.

Despite doing PE, Layla was not involved in a school sport. After a discussion with Barnaby, she attempted to try out for the rugby team despite Mr. Woodbridge's initial protestations. After an initially-failed attempt to ruck against Ned, her anger and pride got the better of her and she threw Ned across the pitch, resulting in Mr. Woodbridge ordering her back to her dorms.

However, when faced with a stone golem, unleashed after a field trip to the local museum, Layla was faced with a troubling amount of difficulty which seemed to surpass anything which she had come across previously. Due to the natural armour of the Mesopotamian creature, her unarmed attacks had little effect. It is noted that of Layla's attacks against the Golem, one of the most successful may have been the attack on the Golem's groin area, despite it lacking genitals entirely. However, she still managed to exploit her abilities to distract the Golem for over an hour after an exhausting, drawn-out straight fight and assist in its deactivation.

Layla did not take the revelation that Barnaby was a Drox Demon very easily, hating that her friend was the thing she was meant to kill and hating him for hiding the fact from them. As Barnaby was ostracised from the group, Layla kept a close eye on him; at one point, she and Imogen discussed the necessity of killing Barnaby, which he, outside, overheard. While skiving Layla encountered Barnaby, apparently there to apologise to Imogen, accusing him of trying to steal from Imogen's spell library, physically stopping him from leaving. Eventually she calmed down and asked Barnaby not to lie to the group in future. Barnaby stole a memory spell from Imogen's book, which the girls later found out. At a later meeting the four eventually managed to briefly settle on Barnaby's status.

## Wrath of the Slayer

In the campaign against Penemue, a fallen angel who they knew as their librarian, Mr. Penrose, Layla was initially of little use due to her poor studying skills. When they first encountered a hostile Penrose in the library under the school, Layla was thrown aside by him, but eventually managed to distract him for long enough to make sure the others were out. Later Layla was sent to take the Golem closer to St. Thom Huell, but due to Penemue's power over pen and ink the instructions in its mouth were changed to cause it to attack Layla, who after a short fight managed to disable it by inserting the control paddle into its back. After reading the letter, she initially suspected Robert of doing it, as the message was in Robert's handwriting, before discarding notion.

She contributed heavily to the final fight against Penemue, first by holding the Dagon Sphere, a magical artifact which according to the internet could drain power from him and which they found in the museum's stores, against him after Penemue was turned into a bunny by Violet. The Dagon Sphere sucked some of his powers from him, but turned him back into human form. Layla ultimately killed Penemue by stabbing him in the chest with a sky iron dagger, having done a significant portion of the damage against him.

After the fight went on a patrol to hunt vampires. came back from the patrol but heard the gunfire when she was near the school, joined by Barnaby in Bak'tarbe Mega Form, who destroyed the wall to Imogen and Layla's room. She quickly found an assault rifle with a gloating note from Miller. Layla followed his tracks to a warehouse (closely followed by Barnaby). got in the warehouse by jumping down the skylight. fought together with Barnaby against 10 vampires but got really hurt by the vampires in the fight (bitten, shot, hit with a pipe). manages to stab one of the vampires in the crotch with a stake. when millers soul gets restored doubts about killing him, but end up doing it so that Barnaby wouldn't have to life with the guilt of killing him. she hears Robert falling to the ground and brings him to the hospital. She visits Imogen when she gets brought her in and apologizes for putting her in harms way due to being close to the slayer. She than says she likes Imogen and kisses her before leaving the room.

After James' funeral, Layla became depressed over the loss of her friend and failure to protect him, as well as the potential of her other friends being at risk as well. She avoided Imogen for a while, uncertain as to what kissing her would do to her relationship. Layla tried to cope with her feelings by regularly going on patrols, initially alone, and obliterating any demons she came across. She eventually asked Barnaby whether he wanted to join, and was accompanied on some of her patrols by him.

Immediately after James' funeral, Layla got plastered from the alcohol at the wake, and returned to STH rather drunk. Afterwards, she stumbled into Violet's room. After stamping at some pens which she knocked over - having developed a hate of them after Penemue, who gave pen and ink to man, used them against her and her friends - she walked over to a book open on the table, and was inadvertently teleported to the Library of Fates Told. There she stumbled around looking for a book to impress Imogen with and to make up with her, and was eventually joined by Imogen, who had been teleported there by the same method.

The two ran around accosted by the arachnid guardians of the library, both taking heavy damage until they realised that the books were writing the record of everyone's lives, and found Robert's book, using Penemue's pen that Imogen took from his remains to write a warning note to Robert; they also encountered Violet in the process and she joined them. Eventually the three were rescued by Barnaby and Robert, who teleported them out, but not before Layla made the decision to pull Robert's book off the shelf it was kept on, breaking the silver chain locking it in place. After giving Robert's book to Robert from an infuriated Imogen (who accused Robert of stealing books after reading his book, as he had done so to thwart Imogen and Barnaby's attempt to resurrect James), Layla pocketed Penemue's pen went and spoke to Barnaby, who gave her some romantic advice.

Ultimately, Imogen and Layla met in the common room, and the two eventually kissed and made out, formalising their relationship. Violet eventually encountered them and left, barring the door to prevent entry, until Robert inadvertently entered.

## Perils of Companionship

After the attempt to contact James using Robert's contraption, Layla like her friends was inhabited by a "nega"-form, an alternate version of her with an exaggerated set of traits - namely a lack of inhibition. In these states she flirted more heavily with Imogen (at one point almost choking Imogen in her sleep while spooning due to Layla having nightmares). This also extended, to everyone's surprise, with Layla flirting with Brian Phillips in the canteen, dragging him off in front of Imogen, Robert, Barnaby and Ned Phillips, apparently to bonk after he had spent a biology class talking about her to his brother and Barnaby. After an infuriated Imogen, followed by a confused Robert and Barnaby, Layla returned. When Imogen asked her what she was doing, Layla apparently did not know what was going on, and the group went to ask Violet what was going on, with Imogen going to research at Penemue's library, now transfered to some storage units Barnaby acquired.

Returning to the canteen, where Violet was, they questioned her, only for Brian to show up and tell his brother that Layla was really good in bed. When Layla stood up to question him, he slapped her on the behind, causing Layla to throw a punch at him. When this failed, she performed her trademark move and punched him in the groin, breaking his femur in the process, before leaving.

After talking to Violet, the group realised that Robert's contraption had caused them to be inhabited by their nega-selves, which occasionally came to the fore, and the four raced to the storage units, where Imogen had been affected and was burning books, apparently in an attempt to prevent herself from using dark magic. On seeing Layla, Imogen was infuriated that she had apparently been played for a fool and that Layla had lied to her about being her girlfriend, going off to bonk with Brian at the first opportunity. In retaliation, she drained Robert's blood in a move she had used on Penemue, causing Layla to knock Imogen out. Eventually, Violet managed to exorcise their alternate selves, causing Layla and her friends to have all of their memories back. Layla and Imogen eventually returned to the boarding house, where they attempted to settle the status of their relationship, with Imogen pleading with Layla to promise her that Layla wishing her to be her girlfriend wasn't a joke. She confirmed it, and the two continued their relationship.

When Robert was in hospital, he eventually called the group for help after observing a monster apparently strangle a man in his bed. Layla and the others quickly went to help him, Layla giving Robert her leather jacket for protection. Ultimately, Layla and the others were not particularly helpful until Imogen, Robert and Barnaby managed to research that the monster was Der Kindestod, a demon who drained souls (preferring children), and who was invisible to all except via magical means or the hallucinating. Thanks to Violet's help, Layla and Robert realised that Der Kindestod was making a second attempt on the children's ward, and so rushed to face it. Layla was not particularly effective initially; while she managed to briefly locate the monster by throwing a bed sheet over it, this could not be exploited, and so she moved to protect the now-awake child patients.

Robert was eventually cut down and grievely wounded, and offered his magic-seeing glasses to Layla, who could eventually see the monster and fight it, though it was Barnaby who eventually dealt the killing blow. Layla was distressed and felt guilt that she could not protect Robert, one of the children who had been lethally drained, the old patient who had been drained and a doctor, Dr. Kincaid, who had had his neck snapped by Der Kindestod in an attempt to prevent the group from realising his presence.

Layla encountered Charity, a girl of similar age who professed to be a former Slayer who had been resucitated after dying briefly due to modern conventional means, while hunting after James' death. She encountered her again after Robert was re-confined to hospital, and Charity took her to The Alley, a pub she frequented and a centre for the magic black market, frequented by demons and other supernaturals. Afterwards, Layla got drunk with Charity and helped kill some demon debt collectors after Charity.

As a result of Robert being nearly killed by Imogen due to a healing potion gone wrong, a new presence arrived in Little Rosewater, who revealed himself to be her new slayer: Mr. Davidson, Robert's father and ex-demon hunter. Unimpressed, Layla demanded certification, which Mr. Davidson eventually gave. As she did with Mr. Miller, Layla tripped him and threatened him, with Mr. Davidson then turning the tide with a quarterstaff, putting Layla in a hold until she broke free. Mr. Davidson offered her and Barnaby, who was accompanying her and cowering behind a mausoleum, training, but Layla declared that she didn't need any, walking off with Barnaby.

In the morning, Layla told Imogen that Robert's dad was a Watcher, and claimed that he had attacked her. After an awkward meeting with Robert and Mr. Davidson, who had arrived to help Robert back into dorms, she and the others told Robert about the fact that his father was a slayer, and that his father had apparently had a run-in with Barnaby in the past. They accosted Mr. Davidson, telling him about this and Robert and his father had a chat in his car.

The others were still there when they returned, and Mr. Davidson mentioned that he was STH's new Fire Safety Officer, telling them to go to class. Robert, however, lingered, realising that Barnaby may have been there when his mother was killed. Layla, staying behind with him, helped him to sit down and attempted to soothe him. As the term drew to a close Layla found herself acting as an intermediary between Robert and Barnaby, with the latter trying hard to avoid the former.

Over the Christmas break, Layla was invited to the Parkers' by her girlfriend after her parents phoned Layla to inform her that they had to work over the break due to difficulties with their company (inadvertently caused by Barnaby and Robert's shenanigans on the stock market). Due to Imogen leaving earlier, Layla was obliged to ask Barnaby for a lift to the Parkers', a decision she came to regret after seeing Barnaby's car, bedecked in garish Christmas decorations. This resulted in Barnaby's car breaking down halfway to Imogen's house due to the battery being emptied by the amount of Christmas lights plugged into the cigarette lighter.

Rather humiliatingly Layla had to flag down Mr. Davidson and Robert, also on their way to the Parkers', for help, and then had to ask Mr. Davidson for a jump start after not knowing how to, and for Mr. Davidson to do something about Barnaby's incessant Christmas music, which Layla hated. At the Parkers Layla awkwardly tried to get to know her girlfriend's family, receiving a degree of hostility from Imogen's mother, and less so from her grandmother. Layla had helped Barnaby bring along the presents he had brought for the Parkers, and got a set of expensive headphones and a t-shirt of a metal band, which she accepted quite happily. It turned out that a set of presents which James had prepared before his death had been brought along, and tearfully Layla received a reservation for a restaurant in Little Rosewater (matching the one James gave Imogen in her present) from her late friend.

The centerpiece of the group's time at the Parkers' may have been the event that immediately followed, however. Robert and Barnaby had not resolved the issue of Robert's mother's death, and while Layla and Imogen had tried to get them to talk it had ultimately failed. As the group went outside to take a breath of fresh air after opening James' presents, Imogen tried to get the boys to talk. In spite of what the girls may have hoped, the rift became even more divided. Layla offered to take Barnaby to see some Christmas lights, while Imogen went off with Robert to the other side of the town to get some holly.

At the overly-lit house, Layla was unimpressed at the ostentatious decorating, and in particular was put-off by the motion sensor-activated Santa decoration. After a while, the two saw that the door appeared to be open, and the two found the owners of the house bleeding from neck wounds and with signs of a forced entry. Eventually, they realised that vampires were around, and that Imogen and Robert were in danger. As they made this realisation, Imogen arrived outside the house, running down the street from a group of vampire carollers whom she had managed to lead around the town.

Layla immediately sprang into action, but was so ineffective that the vampires didn't even realise that she was the Slayer, and Layla narrowly missed being hit in the groin herself. Increasingly frustrated with the progress of the fight, Layla only imanaged to dust one vampire before Imogen illusioned a perfect choir that caused the vampires to be dusted, as they were cursed to remain vampires until they heard a perfect choir. Throughout the fight, together Robert and Imogen managed to kill one vampire together by using their combined strength to squeeze a vampire grapped between them onto a stake.

## The New Year

After spending Christmas Eve and Day with Imogen, Layla took a lift back to STH with Barnaby, and ate pizzas and kebabs with Barnaby and Violet. Later Layla took some up to Robert's room, as he had quickly left the group. There he revealed to Layla and later Barnaby that Barnaby was his brother. When they tried to discuss it, Layla found herself unable to speak. An attempt to call Imogen failed when the line was cut; when the others went to research it, they realised that there was a memory spell preventing them from discussing it. Layla tried to get Charity to join her against Bur'nakk, but Charity refused on hearing of Layla's new Watcher. When Charity attempted to assert herself, Layla asserted herself more strongly and rejected Charity's demands.

When Imogen later called back at Watford Gap Services, suggesting that Barnaby's Drox father, Bur'nakk, was hunting her to find Barnaby, Layla helped in the failed diversion by accompanying Barnaby outside of town. Later she, Barnaby and Robert researched the Drox and a child Imogen mentioned, only for The Child to appear in front of Layla, introducing herself as a Fate and offering Layla a deal to rescue Imogen from the dimension she was trapped in with Bur'nakk hot on her heels. Offering to do so in exchange for twisting Layla's fate, getting Layla to lose her love or to reduce her lifespan, Layla refused; Barnaby eventually took The Child up on the offer of a deal.

Layla was happy to see Imogen safe but all of them were concerned to see that Barnaby had made a deal. After it was clear that he had lost his Drox heritage, they went to see George Davidson, who after some explanation accepted Barnaby as his lost son once the memory crystal was shattered.

Layla and Imogen's date was rescheduled for Valentine's Day on account of the upcoming fight with Bur'nakk. Layla helped the others research, in particular the cane Bur'nakk used. When waking up one day, Layla was shot by a small arrow which Imogen suspected to be fired by Cupid. The two regarded this as unimportant for the time being and set about preparing for the fight with Bur'nakk. In a fight in the field where they had fought the Golem, they faced Bur'nakk, Barnaby's Drox counterpart Bak'tarbe and three other Drox. Layla, despite being the Slayer, failed to make an appreciable effect on the Drox Lord, but eventually managed to grabble his arm to allow Barnaby to disarm the Drox, but Barnaby was unable to do so.

Eventually Bur'nakk was disarmed, Layla throwing the Staff of Anubis over to Imogen. Layla then decided to keep a hold of the Drox Lord's arm, ultimately wrenching it off and smashing the Drox Lord in the balls with his own arm, though Robert ultimately got the kill. After the fight Layla was sniped by another arrow, which caused Imogen and Robert to storm off in search of whoever fired it, while Layla saw that George Davidson was taken to the ambulance.

When they returned back to school, they confronted Violet over why she had appeared mid-fight, and managed to find out that she had gotten the spell from a figure named Azul. They attempted to smoothe things over with the ex-Vengeance demon, attempting to explain Robert's intentions when mentioning "an eye for an eye", but remained wary. They extended an offer for Violet to join them to study for their exams, which she refused. While revising with Imogen the two noticed that John the Frog had disappeared, causing Layla to run outside to see that John was hopping down the corridor on fire. After putting the fire out and examining him (and asking Violet whether she'd done anything to him), nothing occured and the girls went back to revising.

That night, Violet hammered on their door to get them to wake up, at which point they opened their window to let in the Cupid LLC Employee Imogen and Robert had encountered, who explained to the sleepy two that he was supposed to shoot people who did not vocally reciprocate declarations of love. After revealing that he was part of a union and got his orders from Cupid, he advised Layla to confess to Imogen to get off the list. He was eventually shooed out, but afterwards the two confessed to each other, leading to the Cupid to hammer on their window to say that Layla's name was off the list.

In the exam period Layla, despite being assisted by Imogen's intelligence-raising spells, did not do particularly well, as expected.

## The New Year

Layla's new year started off without significant incident, with the date with Imogen rearranged for the 12th February, and Layla continuing her vampire slaying. On the date at the Little Rosewater Brasserie, they were rudely interrupted by a vampire with a serrated blade for one arm who was dressed as a waiter. Layla hauled the vampire out and dispatched him with ease, and spent the rest of the night drinking with Imogen in the alley.