WARNING: I SUCK AT DEATH SCENES, HENCE MY BIG AVOIDANCE OF THEM.....I'll work on that
Note: I do not own anything involving Buffy the Vampire Slayer (except for this which I myself wrote). I do not own the characters, though I wish I owned Xander. Please, if you are going to put this anywhere but here, ask first. This takes place in a world where Angel never lost his soul
A Chance to Help
Part 1
By Nain
The bell for third hour rang and soon the halls were crowded with teenagers trying to talk between classes. Alexander Harris was not one of those people. He had managed to get through the halls fast and into his next class, psychology. He never wanted psychology, but when he had changed his classes he was stuck with it. The teacher usually just let them fool around. Today however was different.
Halfway through the discussion of stress and its related problems, Xander was doing anything to stay awake. He couldn't afford another detention for falling asleep in class again. After he had gotten into a comfortable position, he noticed something very odd. The room had gotten brighter. In fact it was so bright Xander was having trouble seeing. Suddenly he saw nothing but the bright light. He shielded his eyes in pain before falling blacking out.
"Ugh...Could that be one of the problems of stress?" Xander said, just coming to.
"No" said a deep, yet warm voice.
"What's going on? What do you want with me?" Xander said, realizing he could see nothing.
There was a slight pause before a new voice answered him. She, he could tell from the voice, sort of laughed and said to him "You are here to help."
"Listen, not that I don't like helping it's just...well I've been asked to help many times and what they wanted me to do wasn't quite good. Also I've been told that I'm more trouble then help."
The first voice replied to that statement. "But we are giving you a chance to help your friends, Buffy, Willow and the others. You must help them. Otherwise the world will not be the same. A grave danger has been released, one that only we can stop. However we, personally, are restricted from interfering in mortal ways . However we can appoint a new one to be the caretaker...A role we have not used for over 100 years."
Xander just stood there, with his mouth open in amazement.
"It is harmless."
"Well...I guess I could give it a try."
At that moment he began to feel heat. He started to scream in pain as that heat got hotter and hotter.
Then, as the heat died down, he heard laughter. He frowned and looked up to see his psychology teacher frowning over him.
"Is there some problem Mr. Harris? Some reason why you are screaming?"
"No...I mean...NO."
At that moment third period ended. Xander stood up, and almost sat back down again as a wave of dizziness hit him. But as soon as it came on, it left. He grabbed his books, ran out of the room, and literally tore down the hall to the library. As soon as he reached it, he ran through the door, even though he knew Giles hated when he did that. However he found no one there. So he went out and went to a place he knew where he could have piece and quiet during lunch. Since he was a senior he was able to go off campus which he did.
He was in the small forest in Sunnydale. He found his way to his tree, the one where he spent thinking so often. He sat down and thought of what had happened to him. He had noticed earlier, but especially now that everything looked different in some way. He sighed, and wished that he could find Giles and talk with him. Just like before, dizziness hit him only this time it didn't pass. He shut his eyes and when he opened them, he was no longer in the forest. He was in a house, and from the looks of it he was in Giles's house. He couldn't make sense of it. He knew he hadn't actually physically gotten up and walked to Giles's house.
"Xander? How did you get here...and in here?"
Xander whirled around. The librarian and watcher had scared him. "Giles! Well...um...Oh! I'm late! I've gotta go. Can't have detention . Talk to you later."
With that he ran out of Giles's house. What he had said was true. He didn't want to be late. In fact, as he was running he thought about getting to school. But when the dizziness returned he stopped, but this time he forced his eyes to stay open. This time the dizziness wasn't so bad. What was scary, however, was the fact that the houses on the street were slowly dissolving to show a building. After a while Xander realized it was the high school.
"OK. That's it. I'm going to have a talk with Giles's." Xander thought to himself while walking into his class.
After classes were over, he made his way to the library hoping maybe he could catch Giles alone. No such luck. At the table sat Buffy, Willow, her boyfriend Oz, and, as usual, Giles who was standing up with a book in hand.
"Hi Xander!" Willow said, noticing him.
"Hi. So what type of evil are we up against this time? Wait. Don't tell me. It's the one that wants to end the world. Or does it wants to suck the blood out of a whole lot of people!" Xander said, putting up his usual behavior.
"Xander, I wish you could at least try to be serious. As you all know we have been noticing some weird things. I unfortunately couldn't find anything to explain what's going on." Giles said, not even looking up from his book.
Buffy sighed. "Great, I'm going in blind. Tell you what Giles. If I find a demon, I'll describe it to you after I kill it."
The Scooby Gang discussed what the demon possibly was and also yelled at Xander for forgetting the doughnuts. Xander apologized and went home to get dinner before night came.
As usual Mr. and Mrs. Harris were not home. They were out and probably wouldn't be back 'till the next day. Xander didn't eat however. He was thinking about what had happened. He was thinking about the getting places when he thought he might want to experiment. First he sat down. He then thought of a place to go. Just to be safe, he thought of something close by. He didn't want to end in some place and not be able to get back. He concentrated and when he opened his eyes he was no longer in the living room but in his bedroom. He closed his eyes again and concentrated on going to the school cafeteria. An hour and a half passed and by then he had been to France, China, and many other places.
An alarm rang startling him. He got up and headed towards the door. He stopped, smiled and concentrated on an ally next to the Bronze. Next thing he knew he was there. He walked out of the ally, went into the Bronze, and grabbed a table to wait. For once in his life, Alexander Harris was fifteen minutes early. As he was congratulating himself, he spotted Buffy accompanied by Angel. He got up smiling, waved, and yelled to get their attention.
"Xander? What's wrong! Did something happen?" Buffy said, in mock concern.
"Very funny Buffy....Oh, hi Angel." Xander said, adding the last part out of politeness. "Buffy, something..." Xander never got a chance to finish as Buffy suddenly said hi to Willow and wished Oz good luck on his performance.
Angel, however, heard something in Xander's voice. It was a tone the boy never usually used unless something was up. While Buffy and Willow were getting drinks and talking to some other people, he stared at Xander.
"What's up deadboy? Why are you staring at me?" Xander said, breaking the silence.
"Xander, what did you do now?" Angel asked, getting straight to the point. The less he spent alone with him, the better.
"Nothing...but something." Xander said, frowning as he tried to phrase his explanation of what was going on properly.
"Xander, that isn't an answer. What's this something?"
"I don't know. Something happened during psychology class. A bright light surrounded me and there was this voice. It said some..." Xander stopped, realized who he was talking to, got up and suddenly took off.
"Angel, did you say something that upset him?" Buffy said, coming from behind.
Angel turned around. "Buffy, we may have a problem. Something happened to Xander."
Upon hearing those words Buffy whirled around, grabbed Willow, and left the Bronze. They ended up at Giles's house. There they had explained to the best of their ability.
"Third hour? I saw him fourth hour here in my house. I had gone home to pick up some books and when I came into the family room he was standing there. I hadn't heard the door open. In fact, the door was locked." Giles's said, getting up. "You said he saw a bright light and heard voices?"
"He told Angel that. I'm going to go see him." Buffy said.
Willow looked up "I'll stay here and help Giles try to find out what's going on."
Angel and Buffy went off. When they arrived at the Harris's house, there were signs of life in there. They knocked on the door . Xander opened the door, stared at Angel for a while, and invited them in. He turned and went into the family room.
"So, what's going on that you had to bring Angel here?" Xander asked. He sat down on a chair and waited for a response.
"Xander, what the hell is going on? Why are you acting so weird?" Buffy asked, sounding more demanding then polite.
"I...don't know. I feel so weird. Everything seems different. Look, taste, smell, and even touching stuff seem different. And...I can do stuff." Xander said, playing with his hands.
"Stuff? What kind of stuff?"
"It's hard..." Xander closed his eyes and concentrated on getting to the kitchen. He could hear Buffy and Angel gasp and then start to worry because they didn't know where he was.
Xander walked back into the family room. "Need another demonstration?"
After convincing Buffy he felt no urge to kill anything or anyone, they went off to see Giles at his house, only to find a note saying they went to the library. So they took off towards the library. As they were walking Xander squinted. It was getting brighter, only it was the middle of the night. He halted, as the light grew more intense. "It's happening again. The light, its back." He started saying, before the bright light engulfed him.
However this time he was fully conscience and he was not taken to a place where the voice is. He could faintly see and hear Buffy and Angel asking if he was ok. He never got a chance, the heat he had felt before had return, and it was more intense and hotter then it was before. He was in pain, and his screams were full of pain.
Angel and Buffy could hear Xander screaming, and were starting to panic. It seemed as if Xander was being held by something no one could see. After what seemed like an eternity listen to Xander scream, They both watched as Xander was released from the thing that held him and fell lifeless to the ground.
"Xander? Xander!" Buffy screamed getting down to the ground. She felt for a pulse, praying that he was still alive. Her prayers went unanswered. He had no pulse. She laid him on his back and started CPR. She was still doing CPR twenty minutes afterwards when Angel pulled her off of him.
"It's over Buffy. It's over. There's nothing we can do." Angel said, holding a crying vampire slayer in his hands.
They brought his body to the library, because Buffy wouldn't leave the body. Everyone had questions about what had happened. They had placed the body of Alexander Harris on the desk by the computer. While they were working hard at trying to make sense of what had happened when they heard a gasp for air and coughing. They looked up to see Xander getting up. He looked up, saw them looking, and gave then the only explanation he had.
"He said it was over. That I was ready, complete. "
"Who said that Xander?" Giles asked.
"The one did. I feel even more different now. He said you'd be scared because they had to kill me to make me ready."
"Ready? Ready for what? Xander we haven't been able to figure out what's going on. It might help if you told us what happened from the beginning."
Xander, sitting up straight on the desk, took a deep breath. "Well, bright lights came and a voice told me he was unable to meddle in mortal affairs, that a grave danger had been released, and I was the new caretaker...of Buffy. And then I was screaming because of the heat and the psychology teacher yelled at me. Then I went to...somewhere during lunch. I wanted to talk to you, Giles, and was thinking about that when I felt dizzy. I closed my eyes, and when I opened them, I was at your place. Then, we were going to your place again to talk to you when that light appeared. It was so hot. I felt like I was on fire. It just continued to hurt me. And then the voice came back and it said that I was completed, that I had just died in the mortal way, and that in experimenting, I can discover all that I can do."
"Caretaker of Buffy? What's that mean?" Willow asked, speaking up for the first time.
"Will, I don't really know. He never explained it to me. Only that I could help. Whoa, something's going on."
At that moment, Xander's entire body started to glow and shimmer. As soon as it started it was over. Xander was no longer sitting but standing by the table. It took them a while to realize that he wasn't just standing. His feet weren't there. Bit by bit, Xander started to disappear, until he vanished completely.
The entire group looked at each other. Moments later, a book fell down, and the word Oops were muttered. The group watched as the book was raised and put back. That settled it, Xander wasn't gone, he just was invisible.
"Xander, you're invisible." Oz said, being the first to speak.
"Well, how do I not be invisible? Not that I expect you to know the answer."
There was silence after that until Xander reappeared, looking a bit stressed out as if he had been exercising for a long time without a break. After that Giles had started asking questions.
"Xander what else can you do?" Willow asked.
Xander frowned. "Well, I can go places instantly if I concentrate on going there. I can become invisible. That's all I know. I could try to see if there's some way for me to know."
He started to look like he was concentrating very hard before Giles interrupted his concentration. "I don't think this is the best place to experiment. You may end up doing something very destructive."
Xander smiled. "Trust Giles to come up with a good reason not to do something."
After an hour of discussion, Buffy had to go out to patrol. Angel was going with her. Xander had volunteered to keep her company. That surprised the group, because Xander rarely did anything that meant he had to be near Angel. Also, Buffy started to protest that he might get hurt and killed.
"Hey, I already died once. Besides, if there's any trouble I can just disappear and help by confusing the hell out of the vampire. They won't know what hit them!" Xander exclaimed, happy that he now could help.
They agreed that Xander had a point and it was settled that he was coming along. It would have been like before if Buffy hadn't been acting kind of guarded around him. It didn't take them long to reach the cemetery. Xander had taken off to make sure his parents wouldn't worry if they had even come home. Buffy and Angel had just sat down when he had reappeared invisibly. At the same time 7 vampires had decided to investigate why there was a human and a vampire sitting in a cemetery. Buffy and Angel had started to fight them off. It hadn't been that long and they were down to 5 vampires when a vampire suddenly had a klutz attack. He was tripping and falling all over the place. Buffy noticed and nudged angel. He looked and smiled for a minute before resuming fighting and succeeded in dusting him. But that wasn't all. Suddenly there was this bright light came out of nowhere and flew towards the vampire. The vampire exploded into dust.
"Cool!" It came out of nowhere
The remaining two vampires heard that and looked at each other. "Dude, let's get out of here!"
But as soon as that had been said they both experienced the same fate as their companion..
Xander had become visible and was obviously enjoying his newfound ability to destroy vampires. "Way cool! Giles was right when he said I might destroy something."
Buffy smiled. "Thanks Xander for helping."
"No thank you for giving me the chance to help you....Hey that's what the lady voice said. She said she was giving me a chance to help you and everyone else. That the world would not be the same and that there had been some danger...oh no. I have to find it...if it was that bad to give me a position that hadn't been used in over 100 years. Oh man...this totally sucks big time. I just know it."
And before Buffy or Angel could have said anything Xander vanished.
"Ok. This is bad. He has no idea what he can do and already he's rushing off to try and help."
Angel smiled. "At least he hasn't changed that much."
But in truth, Xander hadn't gone very far. In fact he hadn't gone to the place on purpose. It was some really old looking place that was as old places should be. Dark, creepy, cold, full of dead or almost dead people, and full of bad feelings.
"You think you can stop me boy? Let me tell you something. I'll kill your friends slowly and painfully in front of you and then I'll kill you even more painfully. You don't even know what I am and what I can do!"
And with that, he had reappeared next to his friends.
"So what, you finally thought that you should wait a while and then fight?" Buffy asked, almost glad that he had reappeared. But then she noticed the look on his face. She looked at Angel, who had also noticed, and asked Xander what was wrong.
"Scary... thing. It's what we're looking for. He..." Xander said.
"He what?" Angel said, getting tired of the guessing game Xander kept playing.
"He said he'd kill all of you and then me. It's not something that you want done to you. The place had a ton of dead people." Xander had disappeared unintentionally to reappear next to a tombstone a few steps ahead of Buffy and Angel.
"Xander would you stop doing that! It makes me nervous." Buffy said.
"Sorry. I can't help it. By the time I know something's happening it's already happened."
Part 2
Xander, Buffy, and Angel had already made their way back to the library. Of course, the journey there was done in silence.
"Giles! We have a problem." Buffy said, coming into the library.
Willow looked up. "What kind of trouble? Does it involve Xander?"
Buffy nodded. She sat down at the table, that was full of books. She picked one up.
"The Mysteries of the Magic World." Buffy said, reading the title of the book. "Does it have anything good in it?"
Giles walked into the library, holding a cup of tea in one hand and some old looking book in the other.
"Oh, you're back." Giles said. "I may have found something about what happened to Mr. Harris."
Xander, who had been silent spoke up. "You did?"
Giles nodded his head and opened the book to a certain page. He then started to read from it. "A guardian of the Slayer has been a mystery. It is often times a close friend of the Slayer. However it seems that the person who is the guardian was meant to be at birth. Many have speculated that there is something that brings a Slayer and a Guardian close before his/her powers are activated."
Buffy and Xander looked at each other. Xander smiled, Buffy smiled, Angel frowned.
Xander looked at Giles. "You mean me and Buffy, we were meant to be friends?"
Before Giles could answer, Buffy came active with questions. "Does it say what he can do? Does this last forever? What else do you know?"
Giles cleared his throat. "Well, um...there are some down sides to this. Xander, your aging process will slow down extremely. You will die someday but you will live an extremely long life. Also, it says here that the previous Guardians were able to do a lot of things. Turn invisible, Go instantly from one place to another, ability to use pure energy as a weapon against vampires and demons, go through walls, and a lot more stuff not yet determined. And to answer your question about how long this will last, the answer is not known. Most Guardians, like Slayers, die young."
Xander stopped his smiling but that didn't stop him from behaving as he normally did. "Hey, at least I'll die looking young!"
Nobody laughed, showing Xander that his response was as unhumorous as he thought it had been. It was hard for Xander to accept, more less think about, the fact that he now faced the same fate of the Slayers. An early death scared him. Even if he managed not to die early, he'd probably outlive his friends, meaning watching them die and have normal happy lives. Xander stood up.
"I'm leaving." Xander said before he disappeared.
Willow looked sad. "Giles, what are we going to do...I mean a sad, depressed Xander is not good, nor is having a sad, depressed Guardian."
Angel felt bad for Xander. Although he could exist without the kid around, he respected Xander's sense of loyalty to Buffy and her friends. Even while enduring Xander's insults, he knew that if Buffy or one of her friends were in trouble, Xander would go to hell just to save them.
"I'll go out and see if he went somewhere here."
Part 3
Xander would have preferred to go to a deserted island, but instead ended up where he started from. A room similar to the one with the voices. It was slightly different. It was dark, warm, and gray.
"Umm, hello? I didn't ask to be here you know." He said, turning in circles.
"Yet you came. This is safe for you. Your sanctuary." The voice answered
Somehow, he knew that was true. He had seeked out a safe place to think. A place to scream. His one wish was to be able to help his friends had come true. But with this wish was either a shorten life or an extremely long life. He couldn't deal with so many stuff at once, plus the fact that he didn't like the fact that he was being talked about as if he wasn't there. He couldn't believe they were not including him in the conversation that deals with what he now was.
Meanwhile Buffy, Giles, Willow and Angel had no idea where he was. Add the fact that they just recently found a very decapitated high school student with a mysterious symbol drawn in blood on her arm in the science room.
Buffy was pacing the room. "I mean he's supposed to help me right? Well then where is he? There's this big bad demon killing people and he decides now is a good time to take off."
Willow piped up at that moment. "Hey, he's dealing with stuff. Go easy on him."
Giles agreed. "Willow is correct. Although now was not a good time to take off, he has to deal with his sudden responsibilities and abilities. Each of us deal with things in different ways Buffy."
When Buffy opened her mouth for a retort, a voice responded for her.
"So I'm normal?"
Giles looked up. "Well, um...Xander, actually yes."
Buffy looked to her right just in time to see Xander appear.
"Where have you been?" She asked, sounding more demanding.
Xander smiled. "I just found my new home."
Angel looked up. "What do you mean?"
"It's kind of hard to explain. I got this 'room' only it's not really a room. It exists only it doesn't exist. It's almost like it's in a dimension you guys can't reach. And it is way cool. It's dark which means no more glaring headaches! It's not to hot and not to cold. You guys would love it!"
He cut it off. He just stopped talking and stood still. After two minutes of not moving his friends began to worry.
"Xander?" Willow asked. "Xander, say something."
Oz was calm. "It's like he's in a trance."
Giles nodded his agreement. However, as suddenly as it started it stopped. Only instead of resuming talk, Xander started shouting the word no and crying. It was five minutes before he finally stopped. Even then, you could see he was tense.
Giles, as concerned as anybody else, spoke up, breaking the silence. "Xander, are you alright? What happened."
Xander stared at Giles. "Oh god, oh god, oh god. I killed someone. I tried to stop...I couldn't. I tried."
Xander repeated himself several times before just collapsed crying.
Willow was shaken. "He couldn't have killed anybody. It's not...well it's just not him.
Part 4
"Xander, calm down! Now tell us what happened." Giles said, as alarmed as the others.
Xander made no response other then to stop crying.
Angel, who was holding Buffy's hand, recognized the symptoms immediately. "He's in shock."
Many hours later, Angel had left to take shelter in his own home from the sun, Sunnydale High was already in progress (meaning Buffy and WIllow were attending to classes), Xander had been moved to Gile's apartment, and Giles had taken the day off from his librarian job. It was at that time that Xander finally came out of his shock.
"Giles?" He called out, after taking several minutes to take in the familiar surroundings.
Giles came out of the kitchen. "Oh good. You are up."
Xander tried to sit up, however he was soon forced to lie back down due to a wave of dizziness. He felt drained of all energy.
Giles noticed Xander's attempt. He began to worry about the boy and his health. Now that he was in some ways more special, his health may have become more fragile for certain things then before. However, from one look he knew better then to bring it up.
"Well, do you remember anything?" He said, breaking the silence.
Xander didn't respond very quickly. He tried to sort out his feelings and his thoughts.
"Giles, I don't think it was me. It was more like I was being forced to see the death through its eyes."
Xander then proceeded to tell everything he had gone through. Everything he saw, everything he felt, even everything he smelled he told Giles. He managed to see Giles go several shades of white through his entire recitation of his experience. At one moment, he though Giles would die from lack of coloring.
It took a while before Giles would even talk, and even then he was still a little pale. "Xander, the person who you saw being killed turned up earlier then when you had your..umm...experience. We found her in the Science room at school. This is most interesting."
Xander faintly nodded before the door burst open. It was Buffy, and she seemed very upset and out of breath.
"Buffy, may I ask what you are doing out of school?" Giles said, getting up out of his chair.
"Willow...missing...saw her...vanish into thin air...." Buffy said panting.
At the mention of Willow's name, Xander stood up. Even though waves of dizziness hit him, plus the fact that he was ready to collapse, he managed to walk up to Buffy.
TBC