Setting Things Right by Anime Ronin
Summary: There are some things that cannot be abided by in the grand scheme of things and in those instances a person is selected to go back and to set them right. Naturally, in this case, it is one Alexander Harris who is chosen to do so.
Disclaimer: I own nothing, so deal with it.
Author's Notes: I didn't watch S7, so don't bite my head off; I think that things could have gone better in the early going if a certain Vampire Layer (and no, I did not miss-spell that) had done their job the first time around, so I'm changing things a great deal. More to the fact, I like the potential that Jenny had and, more so, that Xander has as the quiet hero / hard ass / assassin of demonic entities – my story, my rules.
Xander looked around the particularly desolate landscape that he had no idea how he had come to – he'd been on his way out of Sunnydale after Graduation and was about ten miles outside of Oxnard when he started to feel woozy and pulled over for a second. He'd closed his eyes for a second after getting out of his car for some fresh air and when he opened them, the semi-desert that had surrounded him was gone, as was the omni-present heat and buckets of sweat he had been sweating; now it was like he was standing alone with his car in the middle of a computer realm, all flat and oddly-three-dimensional, while there was no heat, no wind, hell, not even a sun or sky overhead, just ... nothing.
"Okay, this is a new level of weird, even for me," he muttered to himself while removing his sweat-drenched Hawaiian shirt to reveal a white t-shirt over his khaki pants and sneaker. "Where the hell am I?"
"The Astral Plain," a voice from directly behind him stated in a firm voice that sounded oddly like James Earl Jones.
Xander yelped, jumped and spun around in the space of a heartbeat and landed in an offensive combat stance that came instinctually with his past Soldier possession while eyeing the person in front of him. The guy was tall, maybe six and a half feet, and solidly built with muscles that seemed to ooze power from under the crisp Navy business suit that he wore with authority and ease; his brown hair was cropped to nearly Mil Spec length, his eyes were an icy blue and his face, while on the border of handsome and beautiful, held a hard resolve that startled him. "Who the hell are you?"
"You may call me ... Lex, young man. We have brought you here to explain something to you and to then send you on your way."
"And whom, precisely, are 'we', kemosabe? Ya got a mouse in your pocket that you wanna let out?" Xander tried to cover his innate fear of this being with his terminal smart mouth, but felt that it would do little more than serve the being's purpose.
"Your kind call us The Powers That Be, child." Xander felt his stomach clench into a ball of acid and drop to the soles of his feet while he felt his face go pasty white as the being continued, "Now, before we begin, do you wish to hear the good news or the bad news?"
"Ah, hell," Xander groaned, really hating it when conversations started like that. "Gimme the bad news first, Lex."
"You're going back to high school." When Xander gave him no lip, Lex went on, "There were several things that came to pass in the previous timeline and, quite frankly, they do not bode well for your world, so we, The Powers That Be, are going to correct some of them."
"Like what, and why only some?"
"As to your second question, some of the things that happened in the past timeline are necessary, like Slayer Summers' and McPhearson's deaths, and the un-souling / re-souling of Angelus. Some things, like the death of Jenny Calendar, allowing William The Bloody to exist and Drusilla to leave town, and Slayer Williams' turning traitor to the side of Light just cannot be allowed to stand as they are."
"And you want me to do exactly what about these things, Lex? In case you have not been paying attention lately, I'm the normal guy." Xander felt his stomach drop from the soles of his feet to the core of the Earth with those words – he really hated it when Cordy was right.
"Yes you are, and no you are not, Xander." Lex reached into the inside pocket of his business suit jacket and removed first a vile of clear liquid and then a plain manila envelope, "First of all, drink this and then we can get started."
Xander accepted both items and began to drink the liquid without even thinking, as if he was being controlled by an outside force, but seeing whom he was dealing with, it was altogether possible that he was being controlled by an outside force. Once the liquid was going along it's way into his digestive tract, Xander immediately dropped to his knees in agony as his body began to be changed at the genetic level – every sense he held became sharper by a factor of no less than five, his muscles hardened and his baby fat stores simply vanished as his mind began to accept a flood of new information. After a minute on the ground, he brought himself to his feet and shook himself off, snarling several vile oaths in Ancient Sumarian, something he had picked up while researching with Giles, before starting in a cold manner – his memories from Soldier Boy and the Hyena were now not so cloudy and part of his own mind, and everything suddenly made sense.
"Yes, it should make sense, Xander," Lex went on with a smug grin on his face. "I have merged the two spirits within you and granted you some of the Hyena's abilities to facilitate you with your mission, as you have no doubt figured out. Please follow me." Lex walked away from Xander and, on instinct, Xander followed the being in hopes of getting some actual answers.
"Alright, now here is the situation in brass tacks – I have been watching the events of the past three years and, quite frankly, feel as if you have been given the short end of the stick nine times out of ten, as have several others within your group. I, and several others, do not like where this timeline is going and, as such, we are going to send you back to the beginning of where things began to go wrong to allow you to change the events I dictated earlier; now, there are several possible outcomes to these changes and all of them are infinitely better than the road your timeline was on, hence what we are doing."
"Alright, I get that you don't want us to get whatever shaft we were going to get, but you never answered my other question – why me?"
"Because of the fact that you have no real destiny other than to be a wild card, as it were, and you have the uncanny ability to be a cold-hearted son of a bitch when decisions need to be made and actions taken, like when the Hellmouth was going to be blown open and your actions to stop it, not to mention your withholding information from Slayer Summers when she was going to fight Angelus for the last time – we like that and that is why you have been chosen." Lex stopped walking and turned to Xander, "Xander, I have faith in your abilities to do what is necessary, even if it does twist your guts to do so. Inside of that envelope you shall find a cell phone, a wallet, some papers and several other sealed envelopes with names written on them – do not, under any circumstances, open those on pains of death." Lex's tone was absolutely serious and Xander knew he was going to follow those orders to the letter, "Now, the phone is my link to you – I am the only one who can speak to you over it, so if it goes off, answer the damned thing. I will give you instructions on what to do and where to be for events that absolutely must be changed, events that much not be changed and things that are up in the air – they may be good, they may be bad, but all things being equal, let your gut tell you what to do in those situations.
"The wallet holds your identification, permits and other odds and ends, as any good wallet should, but know that you can never lose it – it will always be in your left hip pocket if your clothes allow it to be so. I've taken the liberty to give you a concealed firearms permit and carry permit so that you may have a firearm if necessary." Lex looked over at Xander, who had a solid, focused look on his face, "Do you understand everything so far?"
"Yes, but what about the whole 'bullets don't kill vampires' thing?"
Lex smiled an enigmatic smile, "I'm sure you'll be able to come up with something, Xander. Now, another thing within your envelope is the deed and keys to a new domicile near the University – for some living at home is a necessary evil, but you and I both know you are better off out of that hellhole, no pun intended. It's a modest place with several perks, but you are responsible for up keep and anything you wish to add, meaning all utilities and taxes paid."
"Cool," Xander uttered in a credible 'Oz' impression.
"Very," Lex supplied with a chuckle. "One last thing – I am going to place you back in your time on the night of Halloween in 1997; you will still be a soldier and the spell will still happen, but you must ... take care of ... several people in that time frame. Do not worry about your friends," Lex went on quickly, "for they will be taken care of. Your primary mission is to eliminate William The Bloody as he leaves his crypt with Drusilla, but do not eliminate her just yet, we need her to kill Slayer McPhearson."
Xander stayed quiet at that, knowing he would not like having to bury Kendra again – she'd just started to come out of her shell when she was killed, and had things been different, he thought they could have been good friends ... maybe more.
"Your secondary mission is to, upon completion of your primary mission, to eliminate Ethan Rayne in his place of business and stop the spell by breaking the bust of Janus by any means necessary. Your only optional mission, should you choose to accept it, is to break into the Sunnydale Armory and ... liberate ... whatever you need or may need."
"I swear that if you start humming the 'Mission: Impossible' theme I'll find a way to shoot you," Xander growled and Lex smirked.
"Excellent. Now, on your way, Xander, and be careful." Lex raised his right hand and snapped his fingers, which then emitted a bright white light/flash and made Xander blink in order to not be blinded.
When he opened his eyes, he was on the porch of Buffy's house in his soldier fatigues and with his toy gun in hand, the door opening to reveal the face of one Dawn Summers, his Dawn Patrol, dressed in a Sailor Scout uniform with a green fringe, boots and a thunder-bolt tiara. He first smiled at her in genuine happiness and then smirked as the outfit registered – following that smirk was a snort, and then a snicker in her direction, which was then countered by a Summers Death Glare, Version Dawn, in his direction that shut him up (AN: SDG: VD is a derivative of one that one of my good friends in high school used to give me on occasion. Thanks, Jenny.)
"Not one word, Harris. You and I both know that Buffy somehow rigged the game to where I would lose the bet and, hence, here I am in a costume that she picked out." Her light green eyes flashed with a fire as her newly auburn hair cascaded down her back and she let him in, "That aside, looking good, G.I. Xander."
Xander snapped to attention and then saluted, "Ma'am, Private Harris reporting for duty, Ma'am. Ready to go, willing to die, ma'am." At her perturbed look, he then smirked and caught her up in a huge hug, which she didn't seem to mind, "Aw, don't frown, Dawn Patrol; you and I both know that I'm too stubborn to die easy, let along die without taking a massive amount of real-estate with me in the process, which will in and of itself make me a legend for all time."
"That's good to know, Xand," Buffy said from the stairway in her noblewoman's gown.
"Lady Buffy, Duchess of Buffonia, were it not for your sister's glorious use of it, I would completely renounce spandex for you," Xander said while sinking to one knee, remembering what had happened last time. "Now, before Willow comes down here, I'm willing to bet she goes with her classic 'Casper' look."
"One Large pizza, all the way?" Dawn piped in, a smile on her face at the prospect of getting said pizza.
"For you, Dawnmeister, anything."
"Deal." They shook on it as Willow descended the stairs in her sheet.
"Sucker," Willow, who then pulled off her sheet to reveal street clothes, teased Dawn, who pouted. "Xander knows that I've done this bit for the past few years and would do it again."
Dawn looked up at Xander, "So I owe you a pizza?"
"Well, yes, but in lieu of that, I reserve the right to torture the first schmuck who thinks he can come here and try and date you in any way that I see fit." He put an arm around her shoulders and looked up at a wide-eyed Buffy, a snickering Willow and then over at a smiling Joyce, "After all," he gave a very Hyena-esque smirk, "for Dawn, only the very best will do."
"Can't I just give you the pizza instead?" Dawn's plaintive whine got snickers from Buffy and Willow while it got a giggle from Joyce, who walked over and hugged Xander, who hugged her back with interest while inhaling her scent – she would forever be on his 'must protect' list, as were Dawn, Willow and Buffy.
"Now Dawn, I think that having Xander look out for you in the future in regards to your possible dates is a wonderful idea – he can give them the first through tenth degrees and get away with it where I could not." Joyce did not try and extricate herself from his hug, knowing that he didn't get enough hugs at home.
"And if he is the one I want to date?" Dawn's question brought everyone up short and made Xander's heart rate jump about three hundred percent. Dawn would be a beautiful woman one day, but he'd rather kill himself than to possibly hurt her.
"He's too old for you, Dawn," Buffy sputtered out as Willow's face went as red as her hair.
Dawn scowled and fired back a return volley, "I can trump your claim with one word – Angel."
Xander looked at Joyce, who was torn between laughing and scolding the pair, "Joyce, I swear to you upon my life, my soul and my comic book collection that, once she is eighteen or older, if we were to ever date, that if I hurt her you may kill me in any fashion that you see fit."
Joyce looked at him in her 'mother' look and then pointed a finger into his chest; "I will hold you to that, Xander."
He looked into her eyes and said, "I hope so. Anyone who wants Dawn first has to go through me, then Willow, and then Buffy, then Giles, and then you, as a last line of defense – but seeing as they won't make it past me, the point is moot."
"Well said, Xander," Joyce patted his cheek and then moved to open the door. "Now, don't you have somewhere you have to be, children?"
"Later, mom," Buffy said, grabbing Xander as she went by and dragging him out of the house, Dawn and Willow hot on their heels.
++++++++++
Xander stumbled slightly as the spell to change their costumes into reality hit him, but then stood upright as said spell just slipped off of him and went to his weapon, turning it into a real M-16A2 5.56mm with seven thirty- round magazines loaded for bear in the gun and on his waist, but he instantly knew that it might not be enough, so while taking off to achieve his first objective, namely dusting Spike as he came out of his lair, he started to think of how he was going to get into the Sunnydale Armory to procure some more ordinance and just what he was going or procure while there.
"Focus, Harris, focus." He muttered to himself, racking the action to chamber a round before slipping off into the back woods and away from the total carnage that was becoming the scene behind him with numerous pirates and mini-demons running amok and causing unholy terror amongst the normal citizens of Sunnydale. Raking through his memory of former hideouts of Spike and Dru, he soon came to the first one, an old crypt near Hillside Cemetery, which just happened to be a few minutes away from the 'downtown' district of Sunnydale, and was brought up short when one of the crypt doors was suddenly flung open to reveal the Billy Idol-wannabe himself, William 'The Bloody'. He was dressed in his long duster and wincing as Dru screamed from behind him somewhere, not really paying attention while Xander flipped the action from three-round burst to semi-automatic and drew a bead on Spike's chest, remembering how well his bullets worked the last time around.
"Spiky, please don't go outside, luv! My Kitten has claws and is about to nibble at your ankles, he is." Xander saw Spike flinch slightly and look back as if to yell at Dru about something, which was all of the chance he needed to squeeze the trigger.
With a sharp crack and a 'cling' that the action mechanism had used the gas expended to work the bolt back to eject the spent brass casing and allow it to snap back forwards, picking up a new round from the magazine and ramming it home. All of this took less than a half of a second as Xander saw the round strike home into Spike's chest, picking the wiry Master Vampire up slightly, spinning him around about a quarter of a turn and them making him turn to dust before he began to succumb to the effects of gravity.
With no sound at all, save for the reverberation of the shot from the surrounding crypts and Dru's piercing shriek, Xander took off at a quick clip, muttering an old saying from Soldier Boy's memories, "One shot, one kill." He knew for a fact that if Dru caught him before he was able to complete his secondary objective that he would be in for a very long next few days, maybe weeks before she got around to killing him.
Running through the backwoods and occasionally taking shots at vampires, real ones, that were about to snack on helpless victims, Xander found himself in a bit of a quandary – Lex had told him that his friends would be safe, but knowing what he did already know, he knew that he had a few minutes to get to Buffy, Willow and Cordy before everything pretty much went to hell in a hand basket for them. But if he took time to do that, then Giles would be alerted to the fact that Ethan Rayne was at fault for the chaos that was going down and he would not be able to complete his secondary objective, one that he knew he must take care of in order to appease Lex and the others, whom he owed for being able to do what was necessary in order to set things right.
Steeling his nerves, he ran right past where Buffy was screaming as a car went past, "A Demon!" which brought a slight smirk to his lips even as Willow answered, "That's not a demon, Buffy; that's a car." He knew that if Willow saw or even heard him as he went by he'd be called down and forced to help them, despite the fact that he had a job to do and one that could not wait.
"JUPITER THUNDER DRAGON!" The heavens opened up and struck down a trio of near-by demons that were approaching Dawn in her Sailor Jupiter outfit, but did not seem to slow them down in the slightest as they approached her.
Xander, remembering all of the good times he had previously had with his Dawn Patrol and would continue to have with his Dawn Patrol, proceeded to see the world in various shades of red as his finger flipped the selector switch from semi-auto to three-round burst even as the muzzle of his rifle came up to acquire the tango nearest to his Dawnie. The weapon let fly three rounds with a single pull of the trigger and he then shifted his aim to acquire tango 2 and tango 3 even as the first tango went down in a heap of demon mass as it's head was suddenly air-conditioned through and through; two tugs of the trigger later and the other two demons joined their friend in a journey back to hell as the action locked back on an empty mag.
"Who are you and how did you do that?" Dawn/Sailor Jupiter demanded as she stalked towards him, even as he changed out his spent mag for a fresh one, "And you look just like my last boyfriend."
"Name's Harris, Xander Harris, and I can't stay and chat, kiddo." Slapping the mag into place and working the action, he started to run off but felt a small hand grab a handful of his fatigue jacket, holding him in place even as he tried to get away.
"Who are you calling 'kiddo'? I am Sailor Jupiter, and I WANT AN ANSWER!" Dawn's face flushed red with anger as she yanked him back even as he tried to leave.
"Fine, here it is; you're not really Sailor Jupiter, just her mind and powers in the body of one Dawn Marie Summers, or haven't you noticed that your front is a little on the light side and you are also about a foot shorter than you should be?"
These facts registered in Jupiter's mind and she let his jacket go, "What's going on?"
"A spell, cast by a Chaos Mage in town whom is about to find out how bad of an idea it is to screw with this town, let alone with me in it." Xander looked down into Dawn's/Jupiter's green eyes and then forced himself not to get lost in them – if when she got older and asked him on a date, he would be hard-pressed to say no to her, ever, "Look, I know where this guy is and I need to stop this spell before everything goes to Hell, literally."
He took off at a dead run, knowing that time was against him even as Dawn/Jupiter screamed for him to wait, but he couldn't so he didn't. The spell would end in a little over twenty minutes and that was after Giles had beat Rayne around for a little more than five, so he had about ten minutes to play with after running flat-out, even with Dawn/Jupiter running after him still screaming for him to stop, that his legs were longer than hers.
++++++++++
"Is that you, Ripper?"
"No, it's not, Rayne; you'd be in a better position to bargain for your life if it was," Xander ground out as he entered the shop, weapon hot and bead drawn on Rayne's chest. "Tell me how to end the spell and I'll consider letting you live."
"Ah, it's you, The Soldier. Yes, one of my best wo*ARGH!" Rayne went down in a crumpled heap as Xander shot him in the leg at a distance of about ten feet, the sound of the shot deafening in the small store, but he was past caring.
"How do I end the spell, Rayne, this is the last time I ask without putting a bullet into a vital spot on your body."
Ethan Rayne looked down at his right leg, about four inches above the knee, and as he placed his hands on the wound to staunch the flow of blood he hissed out, "You sodding bastard, you shot me!"
"No shit, Sherlock, and I'll shoot you again and in a more painful location if you don't tell me how to end the spell right the fuck now!" Xander drew a bead on Rayne's right shoulder and moved his sights over an inch or so to where he'd miss the major artery and nerve cluster – being shot there would hurt like a son of a bitch, but Rayne would probably survive ... probably, maybe.
"What makes you think that I believe you, ya git? You're a White Hat, one of the Slayer's crew, and you won't shoot me again." Ethan ground out even as he tried to stand with the aid of the near-by counter.
"Oh really? I won't shoot you again?" Xander put another round into Rayne's body, this time in the spot he picked out a second or so after his first shot, and Rayne went down in a screaming, bleeding mess, "I think I've just disproved your theory, Rayne, now tell me how to break the spell. This is your last chance before I start taking shots at vital organs like your heart, lungs, liver," Xander trailed the muzzle of his rifle down to Ethan's crotch, "or whatever else might be available."
Ethan Rayne had been called many things in his life, most of them being true, but nobody had ever accused him of being stupid that Xander knew of – he wasn't sure what was in his eyes at that point, but Ethan's face went pasty white at whatever it was and stammered out for him to break the bust of Janus, which is what Lex had told Xander to do to begin with. Xander pivoted and put a single shot through the bust of the Roman god, which made it shatter into a thousand tiny shards of stone even as Xander spun back around and put a bullet into Rayne's heart from a distance of four feet as the spell faded and the gun turned back into a toy – Rule One of Combat is to never leave a living enemy on your six. Getting control of his stomach and working quickly to make it look like a robbery gone wrong, Xander cleaned out the register, roughed the place up and left out of the back door even as Giles started to poke around the front door for his confrontation with Rayne.
Xander ran back to his new place, a nice condo near the University, just like Lex said, Xander began to calm down and run through his head, again, what must be done to finish the last part of his mission even as he counted the money he'd stolen from the store that held Rayne's corpse, coming up with a grand total of $2,300 in small bills (twenties and under) and over $3,000 in larger bills (Grants and Franklins) as he entered the domicile that was his after checking the packet that had been riding in his back pocket with his wallet the entire way. It was about this time that he noticed that his hands were starting to shake rather violently as the full scope of what he had done hit him like a Mack truck – yes, he had killed a person in cold blood, but later, when he was in a better frame of mind, he would ask himself the morality of stopping a threat before they had a chance to do more unspeakable crime.
Xander jumped when his new cell phone went off in his pocket, scattering money around like a small blizzard before grabbing the phone and opening it, "Hello?"
"Good work, Alexander," Lex's voice came through the phone, "and be advised that Rayne is getting exactly what he deserves for his crimes. Are you ready to make a run on the Armory?"
"Yeah, I'm about to leave for it, sir." Xander scooped up the money and stuffed it into one of the numerous pots around the place, "Nice place, by the way."
"Thank you, but it wasn't my call on it – apparently all males, mortal or otherwise, have bad tastes in places of residence," Lex explained, "so one of the female Powers took it upon herself to choose your place."
"Tell her thanks, Lex. Sorry, but I gotta go – shift change is in twenty mikes and I need to get there PDQ. Out." Lex terminated the call as Xander shut his phone, making a mental list of what he would need for a decent armory within his home as he opened the door and left again, hoping not to get caught at the Armory.
That is the end of Part One of Setting Things Right; please R & R but know that all flames will be used to toast marshmallows and cook my hotdogs. Thanks, AR.
Summary: There are some things that cannot be abided by in the grand scheme of things and in those instances a person is selected to go back and to set them right. Naturally, in this case, it is one Alexander Harris who is chosen to do so.
Disclaimer: I own nothing, so deal with it.
Author's Notes: I didn't watch S7, so don't bite my head off; I think that things could have gone better in the early going if a certain Vampire Layer (and no, I did not miss-spell that) had done their job the first time around, so I'm changing things a great deal. More to the fact, I like the potential that Jenny had and, more so, that Xander has as the quiet hero / hard ass / assassin of demonic entities – my story, my rules.
Xander looked around the particularly desolate landscape that he had no idea how he had come to – he'd been on his way out of Sunnydale after Graduation and was about ten miles outside of Oxnard when he started to feel woozy and pulled over for a second. He'd closed his eyes for a second after getting out of his car for some fresh air and when he opened them, the semi-desert that had surrounded him was gone, as was the omni-present heat and buckets of sweat he had been sweating; now it was like he was standing alone with his car in the middle of a computer realm, all flat and oddly-three-dimensional, while there was no heat, no wind, hell, not even a sun or sky overhead, just ... nothing.
"Okay, this is a new level of weird, even for me," he muttered to himself while removing his sweat-drenched Hawaiian shirt to reveal a white t-shirt over his khaki pants and sneaker. "Where the hell am I?"
"The Astral Plain," a voice from directly behind him stated in a firm voice that sounded oddly like James Earl Jones.
Xander yelped, jumped and spun around in the space of a heartbeat and landed in an offensive combat stance that came instinctually with his past Soldier possession while eyeing the person in front of him. The guy was tall, maybe six and a half feet, and solidly built with muscles that seemed to ooze power from under the crisp Navy business suit that he wore with authority and ease; his brown hair was cropped to nearly Mil Spec length, his eyes were an icy blue and his face, while on the border of handsome and beautiful, held a hard resolve that startled him. "Who the hell are you?"
"You may call me ... Lex, young man. We have brought you here to explain something to you and to then send you on your way."
"And whom, precisely, are 'we', kemosabe? Ya got a mouse in your pocket that you wanna let out?" Xander tried to cover his innate fear of this being with his terminal smart mouth, but felt that it would do little more than serve the being's purpose.
"Your kind call us The Powers That Be, child." Xander felt his stomach clench into a ball of acid and drop to the soles of his feet while he felt his face go pasty white as the being continued, "Now, before we begin, do you wish to hear the good news or the bad news?"
"Ah, hell," Xander groaned, really hating it when conversations started like that. "Gimme the bad news first, Lex."
"You're going back to high school." When Xander gave him no lip, Lex went on, "There were several things that came to pass in the previous timeline and, quite frankly, they do not bode well for your world, so we, The Powers That Be, are going to correct some of them."
"Like what, and why only some?"
"As to your second question, some of the things that happened in the past timeline are necessary, like Slayer Summers' and McPhearson's deaths, and the un-souling / re-souling of Angelus. Some things, like the death of Jenny Calendar, allowing William The Bloody to exist and Drusilla to leave town, and Slayer Williams' turning traitor to the side of Light just cannot be allowed to stand as they are."
"And you want me to do exactly what about these things, Lex? In case you have not been paying attention lately, I'm the normal guy." Xander felt his stomach drop from the soles of his feet to the core of the Earth with those words – he really hated it when Cordy was right.
"Yes you are, and no you are not, Xander." Lex reached into the inside pocket of his business suit jacket and removed first a vile of clear liquid and then a plain manila envelope, "First of all, drink this and then we can get started."
Xander accepted both items and began to drink the liquid without even thinking, as if he was being controlled by an outside force, but seeing whom he was dealing with, it was altogether possible that he was being controlled by an outside force. Once the liquid was going along it's way into his digestive tract, Xander immediately dropped to his knees in agony as his body began to be changed at the genetic level – every sense he held became sharper by a factor of no less than five, his muscles hardened and his baby fat stores simply vanished as his mind began to accept a flood of new information. After a minute on the ground, he brought himself to his feet and shook himself off, snarling several vile oaths in Ancient Sumarian, something he had picked up while researching with Giles, before starting in a cold manner – his memories from Soldier Boy and the Hyena were now not so cloudy and part of his own mind, and everything suddenly made sense.
"Yes, it should make sense, Xander," Lex went on with a smug grin on his face. "I have merged the two spirits within you and granted you some of the Hyena's abilities to facilitate you with your mission, as you have no doubt figured out. Please follow me." Lex walked away from Xander and, on instinct, Xander followed the being in hopes of getting some actual answers.
"Alright, now here is the situation in brass tacks – I have been watching the events of the past three years and, quite frankly, feel as if you have been given the short end of the stick nine times out of ten, as have several others within your group. I, and several others, do not like where this timeline is going and, as such, we are going to send you back to the beginning of where things began to go wrong to allow you to change the events I dictated earlier; now, there are several possible outcomes to these changes and all of them are infinitely better than the road your timeline was on, hence what we are doing."
"Alright, I get that you don't want us to get whatever shaft we were going to get, but you never answered my other question – why me?"
"Because of the fact that you have no real destiny other than to be a wild card, as it were, and you have the uncanny ability to be a cold-hearted son of a bitch when decisions need to be made and actions taken, like when the Hellmouth was going to be blown open and your actions to stop it, not to mention your withholding information from Slayer Summers when she was going to fight Angelus for the last time – we like that and that is why you have been chosen." Lex stopped walking and turned to Xander, "Xander, I have faith in your abilities to do what is necessary, even if it does twist your guts to do so. Inside of that envelope you shall find a cell phone, a wallet, some papers and several other sealed envelopes with names written on them – do not, under any circumstances, open those on pains of death." Lex's tone was absolutely serious and Xander knew he was going to follow those orders to the letter, "Now, the phone is my link to you – I am the only one who can speak to you over it, so if it goes off, answer the damned thing. I will give you instructions on what to do and where to be for events that absolutely must be changed, events that much not be changed and things that are up in the air – they may be good, they may be bad, but all things being equal, let your gut tell you what to do in those situations.
"The wallet holds your identification, permits and other odds and ends, as any good wallet should, but know that you can never lose it – it will always be in your left hip pocket if your clothes allow it to be so. I've taken the liberty to give you a concealed firearms permit and carry permit so that you may have a firearm if necessary." Lex looked over at Xander, who had a solid, focused look on his face, "Do you understand everything so far?"
"Yes, but what about the whole 'bullets don't kill vampires' thing?"
Lex smiled an enigmatic smile, "I'm sure you'll be able to come up with something, Xander. Now, another thing within your envelope is the deed and keys to a new domicile near the University – for some living at home is a necessary evil, but you and I both know you are better off out of that hellhole, no pun intended. It's a modest place with several perks, but you are responsible for up keep and anything you wish to add, meaning all utilities and taxes paid."
"Cool," Xander uttered in a credible 'Oz' impression.
"Very," Lex supplied with a chuckle. "One last thing – I am going to place you back in your time on the night of Halloween in 1997; you will still be a soldier and the spell will still happen, but you must ... take care of ... several people in that time frame. Do not worry about your friends," Lex went on quickly, "for they will be taken care of. Your primary mission is to eliminate William The Bloody as he leaves his crypt with Drusilla, but do not eliminate her just yet, we need her to kill Slayer McPhearson."
Xander stayed quiet at that, knowing he would not like having to bury Kendra again – she'd just started to come out of her shell when she was killed, and had things been different, he thought they could have been good friends ... maybe more.
"Your secondary mission is to, upon completion of your primary mission, to eliminate Ethan Rayne in his place of business and stop the spell by breaking the bust of Janus by any means necessary. Your only optional mission, should you choose to accept it, is to break into the Sunnydale Armory and ... liberate ... whatever you need or may need."
"I swear that if you start humming the 'Mission: Impossible' theme I'll find a way to shoot you," Xander growled and Lex smirked.
"Excellent. Now, on your way, Xander, and be careful." Lex raised his right hand and snapped his fingers, which then emitted a bright white light/flash and made Xander blink in order to not be blinded.
When he opened his eyes, he was on the porch of Buffy's house in his soldier fatigues and with his toy gun in hand, the door opening to reveal the face of one Dawn Summers, his Dawn Patrol, dressed in a Sailor Scout uniform with a green fringe, boots and a thunder-bolt tiara. He first smiled at her in genuine happiness and then smirked as the outfit registered – following that smirk was a snort, and then a snicker in her direction, which was then countered by a Summers Death Glare, Version Dawn, in his direction that shut him up (AN: SDG: VD is a derivative of one that one of my good friends in high school used to give me on occasion. Thanks, Jenny.)
"Not one word, Harris. You and I both know that Buffy somehow rigged the game to where I would lose the bet and, hence, here I am in a costume that she picked out." Her light green eyes flashed with a fire as her newly auburn hair cascaded down her back and she let him in, "That aside, looking good, G.I. Xander."
Xander snapped to attention and then saluted, "Ma'am, Private Harris reporting for duty, Ma'am. Ready to go, willing to die, ma'am." At her perturbed look, he then smirked and caught her up in a huge hug, which she didn't seem to mind, "Aw, don't frown, Dawn Patrol; you and I both know that I'm too stubborn to die easy, let along die without taking a massive amount of real-estate with me in the process, which will in and of itself make me a legend for all time."
"That's good to know, Xand," Buffy said from the stairway in her noblewoman's gown.
"Lady Buffy, Duchess of Buffonia, were it not for your sister's glorious use of it, I would completely renounce spandex for you," Xander said while sinking to one knee, remembering what had happened last time. "Now, before Willow comes down here, I'm willing to bet she goes with her classic 'Casper' look."
"One Large pizza, all the way?" Dawn piped in, a smile on her face at the prospect of getting said pizza.
"For you, Dawnmeister, anything."
"Deal." They shook on it as Willow descended the stairs in her sheet.
"Sucker," Willow, who then pulled off her sheet to reveal street clothes, teased Dawn, who pouted. "Xander knows that I've done this bit for the past few years and would do it again."
Dawn looked up at Xander, "So I owe you a pizza?"
"Well, yes, but in lieu of that, I reserve the right to torture the first schmuck who thinks he can come here and try and date you in any way that I see fit." He put an arm around her shoulders and looked up at a wide-eyed Buffy, a snickering Willow and then over at a smiling Joyce, "After all," he gave a very Hyena-esque smirk, "for Dawn, only the very best will do."
"Can't I just give you the pizza instead?" Dawn's plaintive whine got snickers from Buffy and Willow while it got a giggle from Joyce, who walked over and hugged Xander, who hugged her back with interest while inhaling her scent – she would forever be on his 'must protect' list, as were Dawn, Willow and Buffy.
"Now Dawn, I think that having Xander look out for you in the future in regards to your possible dates is a wonderful idea – he can give them the first through tenth degrees and get away with it where I could not." Joyce did not try and extricate herself from his hug, knowing that he didn't get enough hugs at home.
"And if he is the one I want to date?" Dawn's question brought everyone up short and made Xander's heart rate jump about three hundred percent. Dawn would be a beautiful woman one day, but he'd rather kill himself than to possibly hurt her.
"He's too old for you, Dawn," Buffy sputtered out as Willow's face went as red as her hair.
Dawn scowled and fired back a return volley, "I can trump your claim with one word – Angel."
Xander looked at Joyce, who was torn between laughing and scolding the pair, "Joyce, I swear to you upon my life, my soul and my comic book collection that, once she is eighteen or older, if we were to ever date, that if I hurt her you may kill me in any fashion that you see fit."
Joyce looked at him in her 'mother' look and then pointed a finger into his chest; "I will hold you to that, Xander."
He looked into her eyes and said, "I hope so. Anyone who wants Dawn first has to go through me, then Willow, and then Buffy, then Giles, and then you, as a last line of defense – but seeing as they won't make it past me, the point is moot."
"Well said, Xander," Joyce patted his cheek and then moved to open the door. "Now, don't you have somewhere you have to be, children?"
"Later, mom," Buffy said, grabbing Xander as she went by and dragging him out of the house, Dawn and Willow hot on their heels.
++++++++++
Xander stumbled slightly as the spell to change their costumes into reality hit him, but then stood upright as said spell just slipped off of him and went to his weapon, turning it into a real M-16A2 5.56mm with seven thirty- round magazines loaded for bear in the gun and on his waist, but he instantly knew that it might not be enough, so while taking off to achieve his first objective, namely dusting Spike as he came out of his lair, he started to think of how he was going to get into the Sunnydale Armory to procure some more ordinance and just what he was going or procure while there.
"Focus, Harris, focus." He muttered to himself, racking the action to chamber a round before slipping off into the back woods and away from the total carnage that was becoming the scene behind him with numerous pirates and mini-demons running amok and causing unholy terror amongst the normal citizens of Sunnydale. Raking through his memory of former hideouts of Spike and Dru, he soon came to the first one, an old crypt near Hillside Cemetery, which just happened to be a few minutes away from the 'downtown' district of Sunnydale, and was brought up short when one of the crypt doors was suddenly flung open to reveal the Billy Idol-wannabe himself, William 'The Bloody'. He was dressed in his long duster and wincing as Dru screamed from behind him somewhere, not really paying attention while Xander flipped the action from three-round burst to semi-automatic and drew a bead on Spike's chest, remembering how well his bullets worked the last time around.
"Spiky, please don't go outside, luv! My Kitten has claws and is about to nibble at your ankles, he is." Xander saw Spike flinch slightly and look back as if to yell at Dru about something, which was all of the chance he needed to squeeze the trigger.
With a sharp crack and a 'cling' that the action mechanism had used the gas expended to work the bolt back to eject the spent brass casing and allow it to snap back forwards, picking up a new round from the magazine and ramming it home. All of this took less than a half of a second as Xander saw the round strike home into Spike's chest, picking the wiry Master Vampire up slightly, spinning him around about a quarter of a turn and them making him turn to dust before he began to succumb to the effects of gravity.
With no sound at all, save for the reverberation of the shot from the surrounding crypts and Dru's piercing shriek, Xander took off at a quick clip, muttering an old saying from Soldier Boy's memories, "One shot, one kill." He knew for a fact that if Dru caught him before he was able to complete his secondary objective that he would be in for a very long next few days, maybe weeks before she got around to killing him.
Running through the backwoods and occasionally taking shots at vampires, real ones, that were about to snack on helpless victims, Xander found himself in a bit of a quandary – Lex had told him that his friends would be safe, but knowing what he did already know, he knew that he had a few minutes to get to Buffy, Willow and Cordy before everything pretty much went to hell in a hand basket for them. But if he took time to do that, then Giles would be alerted to the fact that Ethan Rayne was at fault for the chaos that was going down and he would not be able to complete his secondary objective, one that he knew he must take care of in order to appease Lex and the others, whom he owed for being able to do what was necessary in order to set things right.
Steeling his nerves, he ran right past where Buffy was screaming as a car went past, "A Demon!" which brought a slight smirk to his lips even as Willow answered, "That's not a demon, Buffy; that's a car." He knew that if Willow saw or even heard him as he went by he'd be called down and forced to help them, despite the fact that he had a job to do and one that could not wait.
"JUPITER THUNDER DRAGON!" The heavens opened up and struck down a trio of near-by demons that were approaching Dawn in her Sailor Jupiter outfit, but did not seem to slow them down in the slightest as they approached her.
Xander, remembering all of the good times he had previously had with his Dawn Patrol and would continue to have with his Dawn Patrol, proceeded to see the world in various shades of red as his finger flipped the selector switch from semi-auto to three-round burst even as the muzzle of his rifle came up to acquire the tango nearest to his Dawnie. The weapon let fly three rounds with a single pull of the trigger and he then shifted his aim to acquire tango 2 and tango 3 even as the first tango went down in a heap of demon mass as it's head was suddenly air-conditioned through and through; two tugs of the trigger later and the other two demons joined their friend in a journey back to hell as the action locked back on an empty mag.
"Who are you and how did you do that?" Dawn/Sailor Jupiter demanded as she stalked towards him, even as he changed out his spent mag for a fresh one, "And you look just like my last boyfriend."
"Name's Harris, Xander Harris, and I can't stay and chat, kiddo." Slapping the mag into place and working the action, he started to run off but felt a small hand grab a handful of his fatigue jacket, holding him in place even as he tried to get away.
"Who are you calling 'kiddo'? I am Sailor Jupiter, and I WANT AN ANSWER!" Dawn's face flushed red with anger as she yanked him back even as he tried to leave.
"Fine, here it is; you're not really Sailor Jupiter, just her mind and powers in the body of one Dawn Marie Summers, or haven't you noticed that your front is a little on the light side and you are also about a foot shorter than you should be?"
These facts registered in Jupiter's mind and she let his jacket go, "What's going on?"
"A spell, cast by a Chaos Mage in town whom is about to find out how bad of an idea it is to screw with this town, let alone with me in it." Xander looked down into Dawn's/Jupiter's green eyes and then forced himself not to get lost in them – if when she got older and asked him on a date, he would be hard-pressed to say no to her, ever, "Look, I know where this guy is and I need to stop this spell before everything goes to Hell, literally."
He took off at a dead run, knowing that time was against him even as Dawn/Jupiter screamed for him to wait, but he couldn't so he didn't. The spell would end in a little over twenty minutes and that was after Giles had beat Rayne around for a little more than five, so he had about ten minutes to play with after running flat-out, even with Dawn/Jupiter running after him still screaming for him to stop, that his legs were longer than hers.
++++++++++
"Is that you, Ripper?"
"No, it's not, Rayne; you'd be in a better position to bargain for your life if it was," Xander ground out as he entered the shop, weapon hot and bead drawn on Rayne's chest. "Tell me how to end the spell and I'll consider letting you live."
"Ah, it's you, The Soldier. Yes, one of my best wo*ARGH!" Rayne went down in a crumpled heap as Xander shot him in the leg at a distance of about ten feet, the sound of the shot deafening in the small store, but he was past caring.
"How do I end the spell, Rayne, this is the last time I ask without putting a bullet into a vital spot on your body."
Ethan Rayne looked down at his right leg, about four inches above the knee, and as he placed his hands on the wound to staunch the flow of blood he hissed out, "You sodding bastard, you shot me!"
"No shit, Sherlock, and I'll shoot you again and in a more painful location if you don't tell me how to end the spell right the fuck now!" Xander drew a bead on Rayne's right shoulder and moved his sights over an inch or so to where he'd miss the major artery and nerve cluster – being shot there would hurt like a son of a bitch, but Rayne would probably survive ... probably, maybe.
"What makes you think that I believe you, ya git? You're a White Hat, one of the Slayer's crew, and you won't shoot me again." Ethan ground out even as he tried to stand with the aid of the near-by counter.
"Oh really? I won't shoot you again?" Xander put another round into Rayne's body, this time in the spot he picked out a second or so after his first shot, and Rayne went down in a screaming, bleeding mess, "I think I've just disproved your theory, Rayne, now tell me how to break the spell. This is your last chance before I start taking shots at vital organs like your heart, lungs, liver," Xander trailed the muzzle of his rifle down to Ethan's crotch, "or whatever else might be available."
Ethan Rayne had been called many things in his life, most of them being true, but nobody had ever accused him of being stupid that Xander knew of – he wasn't sure what was in his eyes at that point, but Ethan's face went pasty white at whatever it was and stammered out for him to break the bust of Janus, which is what Lex had told Xander to do to begin with. Xander pivoted and put a single shot through the bust of the Roman god, which made it shatter into a thousand tiny shards of stone even as Xander spun back around and put a bullet into Rayne's heart from a distance of four feet as the spell faded and the gun turned back into a toy – Rule One of Combat is to never leave a living enemy on your six. Getting control of his stomach and working quickly to make it look like a robbery gone wrong, Xander cleaned out the register, roughed the place up and left out of the back door even as Giles started to poke around the front door for his confrontation with Rayne.
Xander ran back to his new place, a nice condo near the University, just like Lex said, Xander began to calm down and run through his head, again, what must be done to finish the last part of his mission even as he counted the money he'd stolen from the store that held Rayne's corpse, coming up with a grand total of $2,300 in small bills (twenties and under) and over $3,000 in larger bills (Grants and Franklins) as he entered the domicile that was his after checking the packet that had been riding in his back pocket with his wallet the entire way. It was about this time that he noticed that his hands were starting to shake rather violently as the full scope of what he had done hit him like a Mack truck – yes, he had killed a person in cold blood, but later, when he was in a better frame of mind, he would ask himself the morality of stopping a threat before they had a chance to do more unspeakable crime.
Xander jumped when his new cell phone went off in his pocket, scattering money around like a small blizzard before grabbing the phone and opening it, "Hello?"
"Good work, Alexander," Lex's voice came through the phone, "and be advised that Rayne is getting exactly what he deserves for his crimes. Are you ready to make a run on the Armory?"
"Yeah, I'm about to leave for it, sir." Xander scooped up the money and stuffed it into one of the numerous pots around the place, "Nice place, by the way."
"Thank you, but it wasn't my call on it – apparently all males, mortal or otherwise, have bad tastes in places of residence," Lex explained, "so one of the female Powers took it upon herself to choose your place."
"Tell her thanks, Lex. Sorry, but I gotta go – shift change is in twenty mikes and I need to get there PDQ. Out." Lex terminated the call as Xander shut his phone, making a mental list of what he would need for a decent armory within his home as he opened the door and left again, hoping not to get caught at the Armory.
That is the end of Part One of Setting Things Right; please R & R but know that all flames will be used to toast marshmallows and cook my hotdogs. Thanks, AR.