Date written: Thu 9 Apr 2009
Author: Starway Man
E-mail: theop at kew dot hotkey dot net dot au
Disclaimer: The Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel characters are the property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, Sandollar, Kuzui, Fox, WB and UPN. Anything to do with Star Trek belongs to Gene Roddenberry, Rick Berman, Michael Piller, Paramount, and CBS. All other references you can recognize belong to their various owners. Some of the text is from the various TV episodes, and so does not belong to me of course. No profit will be made from this work, like that actually needed to be said.
Rating: Overall R, with mostly PG-13 parts.
Symbols: " " denotes speech, ( italics ) specifies thoughts, and # # indicates phone voice.
Main characters: Ensemble
Warnings: There is some violence, bad language, character death and mention of attempted rape in this story.
Acknowledgments: Thanks to Buffyworld for housing the various TV show transcripts, which were used in the writing this fanfic. Thanks, too, to the Star Trek Memory Alpha website for all the reference material used during the research for the fic. Also, my deepest gratitude to my beta readers, Nodakskip, Jeff Jacoby and Greywizard: what with all the false starts and wrong turns, this story couldn't have been completed without their help.
Classification: Action-Adventure, Alternate Universe, Angst, Crossover, YAHF
Author Notes: The fanfic is dedicated to the memory of Andy Hallett, 1975-2009.
Summary: A chance encounter goes wrong during the 1970's, and it all ends up in a very different future. Eventually YAHF as well, Angel season 2 style.
Title: Alien Nation
***
"Mr. and Mrs. Spock need to mind-meld now."
(Cordelia Chase, ANGEL)
"The Link was paradise. But it appears I'm not ready for paradise."
(Odo, STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE)
"No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main."
(John Donne, Mediations XVII, 1624)
***
Part One: Turning Point
East End, London, England
April 2nd, 1975
The small flat literally reeked of sex and drugs and rock 'n roll.
It was spring, and life was good for Rupert 'Ripper' Giles as the man lounged around on the couch watching TV. Ever since he had dropped out of Oxford and come to London Town to live his life as HE wanted to live it, instead of the rigid and stifling path he'd felt forced into ever since childhood, the British man had truly felt alive. Alive for the first time ever since Giles had been informed of his so-called destiny, back when he'd been ten years old.
( Shut your face, old man, ) 'Ripper' told the image of his father, who occasionally appeared in Giles' mind to angrily chastise his son for daring to deny his family's wishes. ( I'm done with you and your bloody Watchers! I've got my own family and friends now. And if that pisses you off, so much the better! )
This so-called 'family' consisted of five individuals who were named Ethan Rayne, Philip Henry, Thomas Sutcliff, Randall and Deidre Page. They, along with Giles, liked to think of themselves as people who they could do whatever they liked, and to whom the rules did not apply. People who were free in every sense of the word, however foolish and dangerous such an attitude was.
Giles became distracted as he heard various moaning and thumping noises coming from one of the bedrooms. Philip and Deidre were no doubt screwing each other's brains out again. Personally, Giles didn't know why Deidre was also doing Ethan behind Philip's back, but bloody toffing hell – if the woman was even half as good a lay as Ethan liked to brag about in secret, then Giles figured he might have to try her out himself one day.
( Not today, though. ) Getting rather annoyed, Giles just threw a boot at the bedroom door so as to get the two rutting animals to keep it down to a dull roar, and then he turned up the volume of the small, battered television the group had recently procured. Unfortunately, there wasn't any weed around for him to smoke, the wireless wasn't working and Giles knew better than to perform a minor demon summons just because he was feeling bored, so this would have to do.
Starting to get pissed off at finding nothing worth watching, Giles began changing channels. Finally, he settled on some sci-fi thing from the 1960's that had recently arrived from the other side of the pond.
( What's it called again? ) Giles frowned before he finally remembered the name of the TV show, just as he watched the male lead called Captain Kirk kiss the beautiful black woman known as Lieutenant Uhura. ( Star Trek, that's it. )
Just then, the sound of the front door opening distracted Giles from his recreational activity. He knew that it couldn't be Ethan or Thomas, as those two had said they would be away all night for something or another. So there was only one person it could be.
"Oy, Ripper! There you are, mate!" Randall called out cheerfully. "Come 'n say hullo to me new bird!"
"Sod off, you bloody imbecile," Giles grunted without even looking at him or the woman he'd brought home. "Can't you see I'm busy watching the telly? Just go shag the tart in your room, and then get rid of her afterwards!"
"That's not very nice what you're sayin', pet," a female voice with a Chislehurst accent said seductively. "Why don't you come 'n look into mummy's eyes, then?"
A crawling sensation suddenly travelled down Giles' back, as he finally turned towards the newcomers – and that was when he saw that Randall's new sex toy was way too pale, and her eyes suddenly became yellow as the vampiress morphed into her demon face. To someone with Rupert's background, there was no question of denial or of not living in what might euphemistically be called the 'real world'.
"You stupid git! You invited a damn vampire into our crib!!" Giles yelled at Randall in fury, instinctively reaching for a crucifix before remembering he no longer had one. He then got up and quickly backed away, looking for a weapon with which to defend himself.
"I'm Drusilla," the young-looking woman identified herself, almost absently grabbing the shocked Randall by the neck to prevent him from getting away. "What's your name?"
"None of your business, leech," Giles told her roughly, still looking for a weapon of any sort as a brief biography of the infamous vampiress quickly ran through his mind. The last thing he wanted to do was give Drusilla any advantage, whatsoever.
Originally sired by the vampire known as Angelus during 1860, Drusilla had been a natural-born seer in mortal life, cursed with the gift of second sight. Oddly, even after becoming a bloodsucker the gift had remained, despite Angelus driving her completely mad; and thus, ever since the 19th century, Drusilla had spent a lot of time talking to the moon and the stars and her dolls, especially the one named Miss Edith.
"Miss Edith can be SO naughty," Dru said as she slowly began to sway side to side. "First I got a peep of you 'n your friends, but then I had a glimpse of my kitten and a big fire in the sky. Then I saw Grandmother and Great-grandfather, far away in the dale o' the sun. But the whole town went away, deep down where I couldn't see them no more."
She paused, trying to catch Rupert's eye. "Do you dream 'bout your grandmummy, my li'l Jack the Ripper?"
Giles again felt a frisson of fear. The female vampire was insane, that much was already obvious, but what was less obvious was that she was most likely clairvoyant or precognitive to some degree as well, given her little nickname just now. It made dealing with the damned hellspawn all that much harder, unfortunately.
"Grandma Edna? Can't say I've had the pleasure lately," Giles tried to stall while Randall kept moaning in fear, annoying the hell out of the older man.
Just then, the bedroom door opened at the worst possible time and both Philip and Deidre came out, only half-dressed. "What the blinding blue blazes is goin' on out 'ere?" the male part of the equation demanded. "Can't we have some bloody peace and quiet for once?"
At that moment, Drusilla made eye contact with Giles – and with a horrifying look of triumph, she snapped Randall's neck like it was kindling.
"NO! RANDALL!" Deidre screamed, as her brother dropped dead right in front of her. A rictus of pain the last thing ever to be seen on the young man's face.
"Oh dear, I've made such a mess. Oh well, ta-ta for now," Drusilla said in a sing-song tone of voice as, to everyone's amazement, she just turned around and simply pranced out the front door.
***
Just outside the Sunnydale town limits, southern California
March 23rd, 1986
Ethan Rayne filled his lungs with fresh air, resting his hands of the steering wheel of his convertible. He stared at the 'Welcome to Sunnydale' sign, a look of unholy anticipation on his face. He then turned to face his companion.
"Can you smell it? That's power, mate," Ethan declared with a wide smile. "The power of the Hellmouth. And it's just waiting for us to use it!"
Giles snorted from the passenger seat. "Pull the other one, Ethan. 'Cause it's never that simple, remember? Maybe you've forgotten Cleveland, but I haven't!"
Ethan waved dismissively at that. "Ripper, you worry too much. And hell, all that's in the past now anyway. Come on – we're gonna have a ball around 'ere!"
Giles snorted again and leaned back in his seat, as the bad guy version of the Dynamic Duo drove into the town built upon on the mouth of Hell. Rupert's lip curled up slightly as he watched the houses fly by, contemptuous of all the fools who deliberately chose to live here whether they were aware of the supernatural or not.
It had been a long time ever since the East End during the 1970's. He and Ethan had been living as illegal aliens in the U.S. for several years now, causing trouble and making a few quid on the side as well. If pressed, Giles had to admit he rather missed England, but the Watchers had made it too uncomfortable for them there. It had been his father's dying wish that the Council make sure he and Ethan were finally taken care of, that bloody bastard.
( And to think, I almost became one of those sanctimonious old farts! ) These days, it embarrassed Giles to remember the time after Drusilla had killed Randall. That was when his destiny had truly taken a left turn for the worse, even if he wasn't aware of it.
The group had completely fallen apart after the man's death. Deidre had become a hysterical mess that no one could placate or comfort, and Giles had almost gone running back to his father. But in this version of history, Ethan and Thomas had talked him around before it had come to that. Plus, the elder Giles' ire regarding what 'Ripper' had done ever since leaving Oxford had unfortunately sealed his son's fate.
Rayne and Giles had eventually struck out on their own, delving more deeply into the dark arts, growing in strength and becoming more and more in demand for those who could use their special talents.
And now, they were here to meet the honourable Mayor Richard Wilkins for what promised to be a highly profitable arrangement for both parties concerned.
***
City Hall, Sunnydale, California
September 30th, 1986
The Watcher named Quentin Travers briefly looked around at the office belonging to Richard Wilkins the Third (as well as the Second, and the First), before focusing his attention back onto the decades-old politician.
"Well, gosh! Welcome to Sunnydale, Mr. Travers. It's been a while since I've had the pleasure of English good manners," Wilkins said with a charming smile to his guest.
It was all an act on Richard's part, and Quentin knew it, too, but if there was one thing he had learned during his career, it was knowing when to play along to reach his goal. "It's a pleasure to meet you on my behalf as well."
"You know, normally, I don't see people on such short notice like this. But you sure seem to have quite a lot of influential friends," the Mayor remarked shrewdly.
"Well, one tries," Quentin said self-deprecatingly.
"So what can I do for you today, Mr. Travers?"
"You've got one chance, Wilkins. Hand over Rupert Giles, and I'll let you live," the Council operative suddenly dropped the pleasant demeanour.
"Rupert Giles, you say," Wilkins replied in kind, his real soulless interior rising to the surface as the chipper act faded. "And who might that be, if I may ask?"
"Please, spare me the act that you have no idea who I'm talking about; I know for a fact that he and that other ne'er-do-well, Ethan Rayne, have been your guests in this town for the last six months or so. So if you hand Giles over to me now, I won't kill you. It's that simple," Quentin told the demon-worshipping mage.
"Nothing's ever that simple I'm afraid, Mr. Travers," the Mayor now had his charming mask back in place. "And unfortunately, I couldn't help you even if I wanted to. Apparently, the gentleman in question vacated the town limits yesterday, or so rumour has it."
Travers sighed; he'd been afraid of that. Of course, it was possible and even likely that the Mayor was a liar, but personally he doubted it. Quentin had interrogated enough captives since the 1970's to know when someone was lying to him or not. "And where, pray tell, did he go?"
The Mayor suddenly looked bored. "I'm afraid this interview is over, Mr. Travers. And regrettably, I'm also afraid that I can't let you leave the building alive, either." Richard reached under his desk for the hidden buzzer to summon his vampire guards.
Many seconds later though, Wilkins became slightly concerned as no one bothered to show up. "Well, now, what's going on out there-?"
"Your guards are no longer in any condition to aid you, Wilkins," Travers told him simply. "My men will have taken care of them all by this point, as well as your pet demons in the basement. Come now," Quentin said with a hint of true pleasure in his voice. "Did you actually think that I would walk straight into the lion's den without taking steps to protect myself? Tsk, tsk. You underestimate me badly."
"Actually, I'm afraid you're the one who underestimated me," Wilkins said pleasantly. The demon-worshipping mage suddenly shouted in Latin, "Eximo!" The Watcher was instantly encased in a sphere of green light, and briefly invisible to sight.
Richard Wilkins was stunned, however, when instead of being banished into a hell dimension, Travers continued to stand there in his office after the green light was gone. The Mayor had, indeed, foolishly underestimated his opponent's resourcefulness, even if he'd had no way to know that the British man had warded himself against all forms of magical attack before ever setting foot in Sunnydale.
Travers said simply, "Bon voyage." Then, Quentin took out a handgun and shot six bullets into the other man's chest, the blood spraying all over the room as the Mayor died in a very messy and painful way.
After all – it would have been well over a decade before Richard Wilkins could have ever made himself invulnerable to physical harm, unfortunately for him.
***
Just outside the Sunnydale town limits, southern California
April 9th, 1987
Alexander 'Xander' Harris, roughly six years old, was kind of nervous as he didn't know what was really going on.
Ever since the Mayor had been killed, he'd noticed that there seemed to be fewer and fewer people in Sunnydale with every passing day. It had been impossible for him not to notice that; he was a fairly bright child, even if he was a bit slow in math and spatial relations. However, Xander was too young to understand that the authorities had ordered the evacuation of all the citizens of the California Hellmouth, or why the Watchers had arranged for such a thing to happen.
It hadn't been too hard to pull off, actually. Not only had a lot of people left willingly, now that the Mayor was no longer around to control the local demons, somehow the town had also lost most of its charm for the human population. The Council had used its influence and had Sunnydale declared to be on a dangerous fault line by the state governor's office. Thus, all fifty thousand people had been evacuated ASAP after a recent earthquake had convinced even the sceptics that the climate would be more congenial for them elsewhere.
All Xander knew was that his friends from kindergarten, Willow, Jesse and Cordelia, had left one by one and now he had no idea where they currently were. To a six-year-old, such a loss had been practically unbearable. But now, apparently, it was his turn to leave as well, and the little boy had no idea what the future held.
"Mom? Where's Dad?" Xander asked suddenly as the car sped past the 'NOW LEAVING SUNNYDALE - Come back soon!' sign.
"I don't know, honey," Jessica Harris said absently, concentrating on her driving. The truth was though that she suspected her husband, Anthony, had gotten drunk again last night despite her pleas for him to remain sober. The odds were that he was sleeping it off somewhere alone, with a hangover just waiting to pounce on him when he awoke.
The redheaded woman didn't care either way, though. Enough was enough. The evacuation meant that she finally had a chance to escape Sunnydale with her son and start a new life for them both far away in Los Angeles, and Jessica was grabbing it with both hands.
As the Ford vehicle raced off down the highway, the Watcher named Robson watched it depart with a grunt. "That's the last of them, right?"
"Indeed," a young Watcher-in-training named Wesley Wyndham-Pryce nodded affirmatively after looking at his clipboard.
Travers surveyed La Boca del Infierno with a look of distaste and then said, "Let's get on with it, then."
"Ladies, if you please?" Robson said politely to a trio of women from Los Angeles, three sisters known as the Transuding Furies.
The Furies obliged, beginning their spell. They launched a mystical attack on the mystical convergence-slash-nexus, slowly cleansing it of the malignant supernatural energy and sealing the gateway to Hell, which unexpectedly caused an earthquake.
The whole town started collapsing in on itself, being sucked down into the depths of the earth. Buildings which had been the pride of Sunnydale vanished as they fell down in a cloud of dust and dirt. The quake grew in severity as the hole expanded, larger and larger; until finally, Sunnydale was completely gone and even the signpost fell down into the immense crater once the quake was over, lost from sight.
"Good Lord," Wesley managed to say, moving back a little even as he felt annoyed with himself for showing weakness in public. "Robson, what have you done-?"
"WE have just eliminated an enemy demon stronghold," Robson interrupted, gesturing down to where the remains of Sunnydale were. "Whatever creatures were left down there before the last evacuees departed that bloody town, they're in no position to worry us now. Which is all for the best, wouldn't you say?"
"Yes, I suppose so," Wesley pulled himself together. "Still. This does seem a rather overboard way of going about it, surely?"
"In this business, boy, there's no such thing as 'going overboard' about anything," Travers snapped towards his protégé.
Robson would have added more to that, but the three sisters started dragging him back to his car to go to LA and pay them for services rendered. And the thirty-year-old Englishman had to admit, having sex with three beautiful women like these as his payment for the contract?
There were definitely worse ways to discharge a personal debt, to be sure.
***
Just outside Hemery High School, Los Angeles, California
October 28th, 1996
The balance demon named Whistler watched from his car, an old and rusted Chevy Impala, as the blonde girl named Buffy Summers and her friends came out of the building at the end of the school day. And unlike what could have been – what should have been – he was watching the human females all alone.
Whistler shook his head. ( How did things ever end up like this? )
He knew that almost a hundred years ago the vampire known as Angelus had been given his soul back, in order for him to help the newly-called Slayer save the world from the threat of Acathla; a potential apocalypse that had been scheduled to happen in around eighteen months' time. But now Angel's help wasn't necessary, as that particular stone statue was buried beyond the reach of both man and demon in the crater that used to be Sunnydale.
All thanks to the snowball effect from one tiny change in the timeline, twenty-one years ago.
Which in turn meant that, as far as Whistler knew, the tormented vampire with a soul was still in Manhattan right now, drifting along the fringes of human society, living as a bum and dining on rat blood as often as he needed to. The messenger for the Powers had seen him do it and, personally, he thought that there was a good chance the Stink Guy would off himself in a few more years from the way things were going.
( Well, never mind, no great loss if that happens. ) Whistler's job was to maintain the balance, and if the situation was now such that his personal intervention was no longer necessary, then so much the better. Mind made up, the human-looking demon quickly drove off as the Watcher named Merrick finally found his Slayer in the City of Angels.
Whistler would have been wise to stick around, though, as a mercenary demon named Skip was present not far away in a Lincoln Town Car – along with Angel. The silver armoured creature was nudging the Grandfather along his necessary path, although he was careful not to draw any undue attention to the Mother or the red witch at this point in time. The bad guy just pointed out the new Chosen One to the vampire, and pretty much let destiny take its course.
Skip was being paid a freaking fortune by his employer – a rogue former Power – to carry out her plan, after all.
***
Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina
February 20th, 2000
The years had passed, and while Buffy the Vampire Slayer was still constantly kicking ass long after graduating high school – by contrast, the medical intern named Ben Maxwell was not having a good shift.
He'd had to deal with a number of problems recently, not the least of which was a man who had severe neck wounds as well as a number of holes in his chest and back. The odds weren't good that his patient would survive, and the doctor had both FBI and other police types breathing down his neck to make sure the victim lived long enough for him to talk to them about what had happened.
Ben shrugged to himself. Perhaps his mother had been right, and he should have gone into psychiatry. He might have had a nice two-couch office on Park Avenue as well as a summer place in the Berkshires within a few more years, and not have to deal with hard-nosed cops constantly demanding the impossible.
Unfortunately, though, Fate had other plans for the young man as without warning, he collapsed to the floor. Unconscious and alone, Ben began to convulse, and his physical appearance began to ripple unsteadily as his body – a shell meant to forever imprison something from a hell world beyond imagination – finally failed to fully contain the hellgod within.
Glorificus, or Glory as she preferred to go by, only had a moment's worth of freedom before her energy expired and she had to let Ben have his body back once more, retreating deep within her host.
But the real victory had already been won.
Far away in Eastern Europe, the Key was no longer safe.
TBC...