1. Chapter One

disclaimer I own nothing in the Charmed or Buffy franchises.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Just so you know I'm pushing the Buffy time line back so Becoming Part Two takes place in 2000.

AUTHOR'S NOTE 2

I originally posted this story on twisting the Hellmouth and decided to post it here on fanfiction . net. There are some spelling mistakes that I haven't caught so please bear with me.

Xander had made his way back inside the mansion just in time to see Buffy kissing Angel. "Huh, I guess Willow actually pulled it off," Xander said to himself. Just then Acathla's portal opened up behind the two lovers. Xander was the first to notice, and his gasp alerted the others. "Xander! What are you doing here? I told you to get out with Giles," Buffy yelled. "I got him out, but I was worried about you, Buff. "Buffy started to drag Angel toward the sewer entrance saying, "It doesn't matter now we need to get out of here."

At this point Angel stopped her pulling out of her grasp. "Buffy no we need to close the portal," Angel said. Buffy turned around with tears in her eyes. "But the only way to do that is to kill you. I won't do it. I…I, I can't!"

Xander knew she couldn't, no wouldn't, kill Angel, and what was worse Angel knew it too. At this point the portal was getting bigger and started pulsing with a sinister glow. Angel turned to the one other person in the room. Even though Xander and Angel hated each other, Angel had a great deal of respect for him. Xander saw the pleading in Angels' eyes and knew what he wanted. At that moment Xander couldn't hate Angel. It was impossible to hate someone that was condemning them self to Hell.

Xander reached down and picked up the sword that Buffy had thrown away. When Xander gave a slight nod to Angel telling him he was ready he kissed Buffy one last time, and shoved her to the side. Xander ran at Angel and ran him through.

Angel was lifted off his feet and was pulled backwards towards the portal. "NOOO!" Buffy screamed. Xander grabbed her before she could be pulled into the portal with Angel. "I'm sorry Buffy, but know that it had to be this way and I will always love you," Angel said as he was sucked into Hell.

Xander let Buffy fall to her knees and knelt beside her. "I'm sorry Buff, but there was no other way." She was silent for a long time finally she looked up with bloodshot eyes filled with rage. "Xander run. Leave town and don't come back, because if I see you again I will kill you," Buffy was practically snarling. Xander couldn't believe what he was hearing. Yes he killed Angel, but Angel practically told him to.

Buffy went to stand up and he stepped back. When she got to her feet she started to walk away. "Buffy wait! Angel wanted the portal closed and he knew you couldn't do it. I just did what he wanted," he tried to explain. Buffy spun back around and punched him in the gut sending him slamming into the far wall. Her eyes were cold, almost dead, as she said," I'm telling you one more time to leave. By sunrise tomorrow if you're still in Sunnydale I will kill you." With that said she walked out the door to help Giles get to the Hospital.

Xander stood there shocked. What just happened? I helped save the world, again, and now I'm being treated like a demon.

As Xander painfully stood up he was wondering about where he could go. He had a little money saved up for his road trip he was planning on taking after graduation, but where could he go. I'll go to LA he thought. It's not too far and I should be able to buy a bus ticket fairly cheap. With that problem solved he ran home to pack.

He figured Giles and the rest of the Scoobies needed to know what happened, but with Buffy's threat hanging over his head he decided to leave a message on Giles answering machine. After he left the payphone, he made the call with; he climbed in his bedroom window.

Xander grabbed two duffel bags and stuffed one with clothes and the other with basic essentials: toiletries, Twinkies, first aid kit, holy water, stakes, a couple blessed daggers, and a short sword. After he was all packed he pried open the loose floor board, and cleaned out all the cash he had.

He made one last check to see if he was missing anything, and noticed a picture frame that had two pictures in it one of him, Jesse, and Willow and the other of him, Willow, and Buffy. He grabbed it and shoved it in the side pocket of the duffel bag with his clothes in it. Xander made his way downstairs, one last time, making sure not to wake up his passed out parents. That was definitely one thing he wouldn't miss his drunken parents. He walked out the door and headed to the bus station.

At the bus station Xander had a dilemma. There were no buses leaving for LA till noon tomorrow. The only two buses leaving tonight was a bus to Las Vegas or one to San Francisco. While it would be cool to go to Las Vegas it would practically wipe out all of my savings. With that thought he bought the ticket for San Francisco, and ten minutes later he was on his way to starting his own destiny

Chapter 2

Xander was alone and cold. He had been running for what seemed like forever, but still they kept coming. Shadows that would leap out at him. Some wielded swords others flung fireballs at him. Still he kept running. Then... he tripped over his own shoelaces and fell flat on his face.

When he turned over he was surrounded. It was over after surviving the Hellmouth and multiple apocalypses he was going to die. Then something happened he felt a warmth start to well up inside his chest and spread down into his arms. Suddenly his hand erupted into flame. At first he panicked, but then realized he wasn't in any pain. All he felt was a comforting heat.

Then Xander remembered that he had just been running for his life, but when he looked up the shadows were recoiling in fear. Now Xander wasn't always quick on the uptake but even he knew that they were scared of the fire he had crawling up and down his arms.

He started waving his arms around like he would use a flaming torch forcing the shadows back farther and farther. When one of the shadows lunged at him he raised his hand to hold off the blow, but the fire gathered in the palm of his hand was flung forward incinerating the shadow before it could reach him.

All Xander could do was laugh it was like he was the human torch. Unfortunately that one moment of distraction was all the shadows needed. The shadows managed to knock him off his feet and started to cover him. He was drowning in shadows. He couldn't breathe, and then he started to go numb. The pleasant warmth started to fade slowly from his arms and chest until only a small ember remained in his heart.

NO!

I will not die like this. Xander was mad. No Xander was furious. All of a sudden the small ember started to burn like an inferno. The fire literally exploded out of his body destroying all the shadows. Then Xander woke up.

As Xander looked around he noticed that they were heading into San Francisco. Almost there he thought to himself. As they pulled into the bus stop and he got his bags he never noticed that his seat was singed.

Upper Realm

"Did you feel that?" "Yes it seems that an Aiken witch has finally left the Hellmouth. We must learn who they are." "Who knows how corrupt they are now thanks to the Hellmouth's energies. We should probably just have the Charmed Ones deal with them," Elder Odin said. "Peace, the Aiken witches were always great forces of good. They even rivaled the Halliwell's in shear power," Elder Sandra responded. The meeting quickly deteriorated into a shouting match.

Elder Zola finally spoke up," Why don't we send a White lighter to observe this new witch to determine if they are indeed a threat." Many of the Elders agreed with his plan; however Elder Odin had to put his two cents in. "Yes but who should we send. In case your forgetting the Hellmouth energies are subtle and not easily detected, and only a few of our White lighters can even go near a Hellmouth without being poisoned and risk turning into a Dark lighter." "Why not send Sandra was she not a slayer. She should know the Hellmouth's energies better than most of us. She is also one of the only White lighters who can handle them self in a fight if it comes to that," an Elder in the back said.

Elder Zola looked around at the gathered Elders and asked, "Are we in agreement?" Seeing there nods of consent he smiled and said," Then call for Sandra and give her charges to others this requires her full attention.

Meanwhile in a slightly worse for wear hotel

"Well it could be better, but it's warm and it has a shower," Xander said to himself. Now if I can find a job tomorrow I'll be just peachy he thought. Xander changed and hopped in bed. As he turned off the light his last thought was I wonder how the gang is doing.

3. Chapter 3

Sandra was bored. She had been a White Lighter for 64 years now, and this was by far the worst assignment yet. Being a past slayer she kept her heightened senses and reflexes; however, she only had half of her past strength. Unfortunately she also kept the restlessness of the slayer, and that's what was driving her crazy.

Sandra was generally given the more active charges the ones who face demons and danger every day. She was even supposed to be the Charmed Ones White Lighter, but it was decided she already had too many charges and the Charmed Ones would need special attention.

As you can tell she liked action, so babysitting a 17 year old witch, no matter how powerful, was boring. The kid was normal and that was saying something considering he grew up on the Hellmouth. She had been watching him for a week already, and though she wondered where he learned how to sling drinks he didn't do anything out of the ordinary.

She had easily been able to tell that he wasn't being influenced by the Hellmouth's energies, but there was something off with his soul. She just couldn't tell what. Sandra was going to contact an aura reader tomorrow to take a closer look.

The only thing remotely interesting was his records. Multiple trips to the E.R., lots of crime reports (either as a suspect or witness), and his grads dropped a lot in his sophomore year. A little more digging and a few informants showed that Alexander Lavelle Harris was anything but your typical runaway. Sandra easily saw the signs of a demon hunter, but not just any demon hunter but one fighting with a slayer.

She finally got the full story when she made a stop at Willie's Alibi Room in Sunnydale. Apparently Alexander or "Xander" had been fighting with the slayer for the past two years along with his other friend a Willow Rosenberg a practitioner. They past couple of months they had been fighting against Angelus "The Scourge of Europe". He had the great idea to open a portal to Hell using Acathla. When they managed to get his soul back it was too late and the portal had already been opened. The Slayer wouldn't kill her reensouled lover so Xander stabbed Angel in order to close the portal. The Slayer took the loss of her lover rather badly and threatened him with death if he didn't leave town, so now he's here and her problem.

When she checked out his room she didn't find much; clothes, toiletries, food wrappers, and weapons! That defiantly proved he was a demon hunter. She was ready to make her report to the Elders all she was waiting for was the deeper scan of his aura.

Boa Cervexa

Xander was surprised that he actually learned something useful from his parents. All of the drinks he's had to make over the years managed to help get him a job as a bar tender ant Boa Cervexa. It wasn't the best bar in the city, but the crowd had been getting bigger the longer he worked there. He never even thought it might be because he was attracting more clientele due to his skills mixing drinks. He managed to get the job a four days age even though he was underage. In a couple of weeks he might be able to get a cheap apartment.

Xander had tried patrolling the first couple of nights he was here, but the graveyards were dead in a good way. He still kept an eye out but nothing demonic jumped out at him. He only had two problems the first was that he kept feeling like someone was watching him. He never found anyone but he still felt eyes on him. The second problem was ever since his dream on the bus his hands were constantly warm, or sometimes even hot.

He was probably just jumping at shadows, but living on the Hellmouth tends to make one cautious. What he wouldn't do to be able to talk to Giles right now, but he was avoiding all of the Scoobies at the moment. He didn't want them to hate him just like Buffy.

"Harris! Get back to cleaning up. I want to be out of here before three tonight," Mike yelled. Mike owned the bar, and was a pretty nice guy. The only thing he told Xander, when he started to work there, was not to drink until he's legal or he'd kick his sorry but to the curb. "Yes sir, Boss man sir," Xander replied.

"See ya tomorrow Boss man," Xander said as Mike locked up for the night. "Night kid and be safe. I don't want to have to hire another bartender so soon," Mike replied. Xander started heading back to his hotel room shadowed by Sandra. When he was still two blocks away he heard a scream. "Crap! Here I thought this city was demon free," he complained to himself. He pulled out his blessed daggers as he ran towards the scream.

As he rounded the corner he saw a young blonde probably 18-20 years old. She had on dark blue jeans a green tank top with a jean jacket. Her pants were ripped on one leg with a shallow cut underneath, but the more serious wounds were the ones on her arms. Xander could tell that the slashes on her arms were defensive.

Standing over top of her was a humanoid figure with green skin and clawed hands and feet. It was dressed in rags causing it to look like a homeless person. Of course Xander being Xander charges head on yelling, "Hey ugly." Not the most creative line but it got the demons attention.

The demon turned slashing at Xander's face, but Xander ducked underneath the blow and managed to tackle the demon to the ground. somehow Xander landed on top and was able to plunge one of his daggers into its chest. The demon howled in pain from the blessed metal, but was able to throw Xander off. Both of the combatants climbed to their feet and Xander tried for another lunge. The demon was prepared this time and used his momentum against him and slammed him into the wall of the alley. Xander fell to the ground and the demon was on top of him slashing away at his chest and arms. Somehow Xander was able to snake his other dagger up and managed to slit the demons throat. As the demon reeled back Xander followed and managed to bury his dagger in the demons head scrambling its brains.

When the demon fell to the ground it turned into a bunch of green goo. "Huh, nifty no clean up," Xander said right before he passed out from the poison he didn't know was on the demons claws.

CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! "Nice job kid we'll need to work on some better forms when I'm officially your Whiter Lighter, but nice job," Sandra said stepping out of the shadows where she watched the whole fight. She healed the girl first, since she had been exposed to the poison longer, then went and healed her charge. She looked through the girl's purse and found her driver's license and found out she lived about four blocks over. Sandra orbed the girl then came back and orbed her charge into his hotel room. "Sleep tight Alex. You show a great deal of potential we just need to work on your technique. When I'm through with you you'll be able to take down all manners of demons without your powers, and with them you'll be incredible," she said before orbing out. She had a report to make.