Xander Harris was, in many ways, a remarkable young man. He had fought against the darkness of the Hellmouth for two years now, ever since near the start of his Sophomore year at Sunnydale High School. In those years, he had faced off against countless vampires, stared down the Master Vampire Angelus, almost been turned into a fish monster, had been possessed by a Hyena Primal Spirit, and occasionally dared to talk back to his school principal. On a personal note, he even managed to form an intense and caring relationship with the self-proclaimed Queen of the school, Cordelia Chase. In most circumstances, he would have rightly been proud of his life. Alas, due to his company, he could never truly see any reason to be proud.
His best friend, Willow Rosenberg, was a genuine genius. She could hack into nearly any computer system, pass any test with little effort, and absorbed languages at such a quick rate that she was an invaluable resource in researching the weaknesses of the demons that stalked the streets. Not satisfied with that, she was also a budding witch, though she was still getting the hang of the basic skills and could just barely levitate a pencil. Xander was sure, if she survived this night, she would one day become a witch to be reckoned with.
His father figure, Rupert "Don't call me G-Man" Giles, was a Watcher. While Willow could run circles around Giles in anything technological, Giles's knowledge of Demon Lore and medieval weaponry would take years to ever equal. And, as Xander learned recently, he had a dark streak and a past as a warlock. Not only was he the one who directed research and always found the way to kill the demon of the day, he could kick some serious ass when the occasion called for it.
And then there was his hero (and unrequited crush), Buffy Summers, the Vampire Slayer. She was the superhero of the group, the one who willing went toe to toe with the demonic hordes and always be the only one to walk away alive. The day she arrived, Xander was introduced to the demons that hunted the people of Sunnydale. Shortly after her introduction, his best friend Jesse was turned into a vampire who Xander staked. From that moment, Xander swore to always help The Slayer. As he got to know the parts of Buffy that weren't The Slayer, he also swore to always be there for his friend Buffy.
Those three extraordinary individuals were enough to make Xander feel unremarkable, but then there were the ancillary significant others.
There was his own girlfriend, Cordelia. She was perhaps the most normal member of the group. But, she still had the reputation as the most popular girl in the school. And she was fearless in her criticism of others, super powers or not. Plus, there were the physical attributes that made Xander very happy to be her boyfriend. Xander never felt that he could quite measure up to her.
Willow's boyfriend, Daniel "Oz" Osbourne, was… well he was mostly just Willow's boyfriend and wasn't really all that involved with the fight. He mainly focused on protecting Willow (which made Xander like him very much). Even then, Oz was a guitarist in a band and a werewolf. He exuded a sense of coolness that Xander could never hope to match.
Finally, there was Buffy's kind of ex-Boyfriend. The Vampire With A Soul™ known as Angel (though he no longer had a soul and went by Angelus) aka Dead Boy aka Overbite aka Undead Liar Guy. He was… well he was a Master Vampire who had the powers and skills to make him an equal to Buffy. Xander knew that Angel had good attributes, but while others saw a man, all Xander ever saw was another vampire who needed to be staked. Before Xander knew Angel was a vampire, Xander knew him as a grown man trying to seduce a 15-year-old girl. After that, he saw a dead body trying to seduce a living girl and a vampire confusing a Vampire Slayer in her mission. In short, he really hated Dead Boy. But he couldn't deny the value he brought to the fight against the darkness.
With the company Xander kept, and with everyone's primary focus on supporting Buffy, it was unsurprising that such a remarkable young man would believe himself unremarkable. As far as he was concerned, he was the donut retriever, the comic relief, and the human shield. Had he (or others) given him a critical look, they would have realized that he held within him a will of iron when it came to the fight against the demonic hordes and an indomitable spirit when it came to the protection of his loved ones. He fought for the people of the world, yes, but more specifically he fought for his friends. He fought for Willow. He fought for Buffy. He fought for Cordelia. He fought for Giles. He didn't really fight for Oz. Screw Dead Boy!
Speaking of Dead Boy and the previously mentioned recent lack of soul, that is what brought him to where he was at this moment in time. Currently driving Oz's van to meetup with Buffy. Tonight, Angelus was preparing to open the portal to the Demonic Realm of Acathla. If successful, the world would be sucked into a Hell Dimension of eternal torment. Buffy, who had finally gotten up the nerve to kill Angelus (despite desperately wanting her true love, Angel, to somehow return), was making her way to stop Angelus and possibly rescue a kidnapped Giles. Xander was rushing to meet her to provide whatever support he could.
As he pulled up near her, he remembered Willow's last request to him. Willow, despite having just woken up from a coma and being a novice witch, was going to try to cast a spell to shove Angel's soul back into his body. A spell that was a dubious translation of a Romani spell that required an entire coven of experienced witches. If the world wasn't on the line or if anyone agreed with his concerns, Xander would have tried harder to stop Willow from trying. As it was, Xander was certain that Willow would fail and just hoped that she wouldn't die from the attempt. Willow had asked Xander to tell Buffy that the spell was going to be cast. As far as Xander was concerned, this would be his last time seeing Willow alive and this was her last request.
Xander wasn't sure what to do. Should he honor Willow's last request? Would telling Buffy cause her to lose her will to fight with all her being? Perhaps Willow would die tonight, but should he risk the lives of his other loved ones to fulfil Willow's request? When he thought of it like that, the answer was obvious.
Xander chose to tell Buffy that Willow had said "Kick his ass". The evening progressed as Apocalypse nights often progress, with a supernatural sense of drama. Xander searched out Giles, while Buffy searched for Angelus. Giles was found alive, but severely tortured. Buffy found Angelus, preparing to open the portal to Acathla's Dimension.
As Xander helped Giles to Oz's van, Giles revealed that the key to opening the portal was Angelus's blood. While closing the portal would require both Angelus's blood and a bodily sacrifice (assuming the portal hadn't grown too big to close). Believing Buffy should know this information, he left Giles in the back of Oz's van with the car keys and headed back into the mansion.
Xander returned in time to watch Buffy fight. It was… amazing. Watching as she fought Angelus, sword to sword. Gone was her hesitation, gone was her holding on to hope, she had finally accepted Angel was gone and she was just fighting nothing more than a vampire. Xander slowly crept around the perimeter, nearing the statute of Acathla. He wanted to be there if needed. And then, Angelus stopped and fell to his knees, dropping his sword. Xander's stomach dropped out when he heard Buffy say "Angel?".
At that moment, he knew that Willow had, despite the improbability of it, succeeded in returning Angel's soul. Xander internally mourned the likely death of his best friend, of his Willow. He silently watched as Buffy tearfully hugged her beloved Angel. He watched in horror as he saw the mouth of the statue open and a small portal began to form. Looking down, he saw a sword at his feet. Picking it up, he heard Buffy tell Angel to close his eyes. Xander looked into Buffy's eyes and knew what was going to happen next, and his loyalty to his friend and hero demanded only one response.
"Buffy! Stop!"
Buffy looked up in shock to see Xander, her sword frozen in preparation of running Angel through, and her emotions stalling her thought processes at that moment. All she could do was respond on automatic. "Xander?"
"Pull him away from the portal, Buff". Buffy didn't even notice herself following the command as she pulled Angel from the growing portal. Angel just looked at Xander with an expression of pure befuddlement. Xander looked at the portal, then back at the couple.
He began to speak hurriedly. "Damn it! Buffy, Giles is in the van outside, he has the keys and needs to get to the hospital. When you see Oz, punch him in the stomach for letting Willow do the spell. If Willow is alive… tell her I'm sorry for lying about what she said. Dead Boy, keep it in your pants and don't blow this chance. Believe me when I say I hate you and I get great joy from doing this". Xander then thrust his sword into and out of Angel's side, eliciting a scream from the recently ensouled vampire.
Ignoring Angel's cry and Buffy's angry "Xander!", Xander looked at Buffy. "Buffy, I will always love you! You're my hero, and I'm glad to go out saving you". Xander then leapt back into the portal.
A moment later, the portal closed and all that was left in the room was a shocked Slayer, a wounded Vampire, and a deactivated stone demon.
Xander Harris… was gone.
For Buffy, the rest of the evening passed in a blur. Though a large part of her wanted to run away, she felt she owed it to Xander to stay and honor his requests. Indeed, over the following years, subconsciously she would often find herself asking "What would Xander say?".
Giles was taken to the hospital, where he was put on the road to recovery. Angel stayed in Oz's van, rightly believing that people would not want to see him at that moment. Oz was surprised by the strong to the gut punch that he received from Buffy, though he felt he got off lightly upon hearing that Xander thought Oz was letting Willow commit suicide. Willow broke down in tears upon hearing what happened and would later start taking lessons from Giles to refine her magic, as a way of proving to Xander's memory that she was willing to take magic seriously. Cordelia simply… looked lost.
Buffy took all of this in, but she was too emotionally exhausted to truly care. Xander, the normal one, was gone. He had saved her from having to follow through on the most heart wrenching decision of her life. He had known what she was going to do, and he stopped her. She knew that he had done it for her, and her alone. His hatred of Angel was not a secret and she knew he would have thrown a private party if ever head the news that Angel had become dust in the wind. He hadn't saved Angel, he had saved Buffy. He threw himself into Hell, without hesitation, simply to save his hero, to save his friend, to save his… love. In doing so, he had saved the world. A normal person had saved the world. Not a mystical warrior, or a vampire, or a witch, or anyone with a mystical destiny, just a normal person who refused to back down. As these thoughts continued to repeat and fragment, a subconscious part of her mind finally let go of the idea that this was her war alone and everyone else was simply support.
Though the pain of Xander's loss lingered throughout the group, the world continued to move forward. While small changes did crop up from his loss, the world was largely unchanged. The Big Bads of the world continued their plots and the machinations of secret military programs were unaffected. Time moved on, and the pain dulled.
Still, things did change when the new Slayer, Faith Lehane, introduced herself. Buffy, more at peace with sharing her burden as Slayer, brought Faith home with her. Buffy's mom, Joyce, was convinced to take in Faith to live in the spare bedroom. Willow and Cordelia, not feeling jealousy prompted by Xander's drooling at the highly attractive new Slayer, welcomed and befriended Faith. With a lack of conflict, Giles was able to equally share his attention for the two Slayers. Instead of continuing as a loner, Faith found acceptance and a family. A family who supported her when she accidentally killed a man in the middle of a fight with a gang of vampires, keeping her from ever walking down a road of darkness.
Without Xander around, Cordelia never met the criteria as a scorned woman. As such, the Vengeance Demon Anyanka never came to Sunnydale. Anyanka never lost her powers, becoming Anya. Without Anya, the improbably series of events never occurred that would see Buffy Summers coming into possession of a Troll God Hammer.
The end of the school year still ended with the Mayor turning into a giant snake demon during graduation. He was subsequently killed by the two troublesome Slayers leading him on a chase through the school and into the school library filled with explosives (an idea that came about when Buffy asked the group "What would Xander say?"). After the victory and destruction of Sunnydale High, Angel still left for Los Angeles followed by Cordelia and Faith (she loved her new family but wanted to spread her wings and keep Angel safe for Buffy's peace of mind).
The next year at Sunnydale University went largely as it would have gone had Xander remained. Willow and Oz still ended up breaking up, and Willow met and fell in love with a fellow witch named Tara. Buffy started a relationship with a soldier named Riley. And the group ended up having to fight a Cyborg-Demon Hybrid named Adam. An enjoining spell was cast, with Riley acting as the heart for the spell, though his contribution was less effective than Xander's would have been, they still defeated Adam. But, having been joined with the group, Riley came to understand that while Buffy truly appreciated his contribution to the fight, he was a placeholder for Buffy's heart. Riley would end up leaving Buffy and Sunnydale before the next year was done.
The year after Adam saw the birth of Buffy's younger sister, Dawn. Though everyone remembered her as Buffy's sister, she was in fact The Key to the seal between dimensions made flesh in the form of a 14-year-old girl. When Buffy realized Dawn's status, she asked herself what Xander would say, and immediately shared the news with Dawn, Faith (who came to visit), and her mom while making sure Dawn knew that she was their family no matter what her origins. This had a remarkably calming effect and prevented a great deal of needless angst over the remainder of the year.
As the year progressed, Buffy kept running into an extremely powerful blonde woman. The woman, Glory, was eventually revealed to be a Hell Goddess who fed on the sanity of the residents of Sunnydale (leaving her victims in the mental wards of the many hospitals in town). She was seeking The Key (though did not it was Dawn), so she could return to her home dimension. Using The Key in such a fashion would lead to the unfortunate side effect of Buffy's dimension being annihilated. Despite hiding Dawn away as best she could, everything came to a head after Tara had her sanity eaten by Glory and Dawn was revealed as The Key. In short order, Dawn was bleeding at the top of a rickety tower with a portal opening below her in mid-air, with her sister standing in front of her. On the ground, Willow had just dropped from magical exhaustion and Glory (no longer slowed by the witch's spells) stared up at the portal in joy (without any true weapon to fight a god, like a Troll God Hammer, the Scoobys hadn't had much of a hope in this fight).
Dawn Summers looked down through the grate of the tower into the heart of the violently storming portal. Dread filled her heart, as she touched the shallow cuts on her skin and looked at the blood shining on her fingertips. Her blood. Her blood opened this portal, and it would stay open while her blood still flowed. It was unfair. It was so damned unfair. She had memories of a full life, but she had only truly come into existence less than a year ago. She wanted a full life, damnit, and she wasn't even going to make it a full year. Now, there was only one path she could take.
Buffy looked at the portal and then at her sister. She looked into Dawn's eyes and saw something that she was certain Xander had seen in her own eyes all those years ago. Dawn's eyes spoke of a terrible decision being made and the welling up of courage to follow through. Buffy prepared herself and caught Dawn as she tried to make a break for the edge of the tower after apologizing to Buffy.
Dawn begged for Buffy to let her go. She explained that the portal would not close until her blood stopped flowing. That it had to be her. She couldn't let the world die. As Dawn explained, and begged for Buffy to understand, the portal shot out a bolt of electricity and a large black dragon appeared in the skies of Sunnydale. The dragon gave off a terrible screech and flew past the two girls. Buffy and Dawn only registered the dragon enough to ensure they were knocked over by it, so they did not notice a tall cloaked figure riding the dragon who was holding a sword wreathed in a vibrant green aura.
As Dawn talked about her blood, begging for Buffy to let her save the world. Buffy focused in on Dawn's blood shining on her fingers and realized that there was another option than sacrificing Dawn. Dawn and Buffy were sisters, regardless of mystical origins. Dawn's blood and Buffy's blood were alike. Perhaps they were enough alike that Buffy could take Dawn's place. She prayed that was the case, though knew that if her own blood didn't close the portal then Dawn would likely jump anyway. At least this way, there was a chance of Dawn's survival. As she prepared herself to sacrifice her life, she explained to Dawn about the blood, she told Dawn to give her love to everyone, and begged Dawn to live her life. With her last words said, she turned towards the edge of the tower preparing to make her leap.
With a smile, she remembered the words spoken to her years ago in front of another portal. Words she never shared with anyone. She looked back at her sister with a sad smile and spoke. "Dawn, I will always love you! You're my hero, and I'm glad to go out saving you". With that she ran and leapt off the tower towards the raging portal below. As she ran, she didn't notice the dragon racing towards the portal. As she leapt, she didn't notice the rider pointing his sword at the portal.
Mere inches from the portal, as a tendril of electric energy snaked towards Buffy, a bright green light slammed into the tendril. The tendril dissipated, and the light barreled on into the center of the portal. The portal collapsed in on itself, and instead falling into a portal, Buffy fell through the empty space and into the arms of the dragon rider. The rider whispered into the Slayer's ear as the dragon landed on the ground below, and Buffy grabbed the rider in a hug that was clearly not likely to end anytime soon.
The rider dismounted the dragon, and an inhuman cry of rage filled the air. An extremely angry Hell Goddess stomped up to the rider. "YOU! All I wanted to do was go home and get off this pathetic excuse of a mudball in this depressing little dimension, and I was … ALMOST… THERE! You closed my portal, and I am going to have to setup a brand-new ritual with my Key. Now, before I rip your arms off your body and beat you and your dragon to death with them, do you have any final words to say? You know, besides 'Ow, my arm! Please stopping beating me!'"
The rider pulled the hood of his cloak down, revealing his face. A familiar smiling face looked into the eyes of the blonde, stylishly dressed, and enraged Hell Goddess and spoke three words. "Hello Morning Glory".
Glory took one step back in surprise. And then, speaking in a previously unheard tentative voice, silently addressed the man. "Uncle Xan?"
With a nod from the man, he suddenly found himself being tightly hugged by two blonde super powered women.
Everyone else present and aware just wordlessly stared as their brains tried to make sense of two mortal enemies, Slayer and Hell Goddess, hugging the same man. A man who couldn't possibly be standing there, and yet clearly was.
Xander Harris… was back.