Double or Nothin'

Xander blinked and looked around. It was total chaos and seriously reminded him of a long-ago Halloween in Sunnydale. Catching a glimpse of his reflection in a store window caused him to freeze for a moment. He looked... young.

He spotted another version of himself, dressed as a soldier and following a ghostly Willow. He was now pretty sure he knew where he was, and even when, but not why. Never one to let an opportunity slip by, he ran towards a green glow less than a block away where he knew a Green Lantern was fighting with a Yellow Lantern.

Fortunately, the two jocks who'd dressed as Lanterns had decided on generic Lantern characters named after themselves and not any of the big names in the ring game, so Xander had a chance of pulling off what he was about to do. Xander whispered a word of power, causing a wave of fear to spread half-way down the block and causing both Lanterns to falter as the fear eroded the Green Lantern's will and the Yellow Lantern's ring wavered in its choice of users and became inactive. Xander steadied his nerves and said the word a second time, driving both Lanterns to the ground. Sunnydale's long history of making sure its back alleys had plenty of wooden debris to stake vampires provided Xander with a two-by-four which he swung at the Green Lantern who looked surprised that his hastily raised shield did nothing to stop it. The Yellow Lantern ripped the board from Xander's hand, but a boot to the nuts and a head-butt left him unconscious as well. Xander stripped them of their rings and tossed the two in a dumpster so nothing would eat them, then slid the rings on his own fingers with Will on the right hand and Fear on the left.

He knew the Avengers were fighting a free-for-all only one block over and it was a huge risk, but the chance of getting his hands on Thor's hammer or Captain America's shield was irresistible. Running down the alley, acutely aware of how little time he had, Xander came to a stop at a small crater with a hammer in it. Grabbing it, he tried to lift it and almost hurt himself. Seeing an approaching hero, he ducked behind a dumpster. Captain America grabbed the hammer out of the crater and flung it back into the melee before quickly blocking an explosive arrow with his shield and then throwing it to block a nearly identical shield that had ricocheted off the building behind him, aimed for his neck. On contact with each other, both shields dropped to the floor of the alley - all kinetic energy absorbed into their unique molecular structure.

"Taskmaster," Captain America called out, causing a skull-masked warrior to step out of the shadows.

"Captain," he said politely as he slid his bow on his back. "Shall we?"

As the two attacked one another, Xander blessed his luck and split with their shields. Xander was huffing and puffing after only a short distance. He'd seriously underestimated how much they weighed or overestimated how strong he was, possibly both.

Remembering the rings, he willed the shields lighter and almost sighed in relief as it felt like gravity had vanished and he shot forward, leaving behind the battling super heroes. The two rings felt very similar in his mind as he explored his connection to them, with the green ring feeling more intelligent but the yellow one less restricted. He was rewarded for his momentary inattention by slamming face-first into a wall and getting knocked on his ass. Climbing back to his feet, he found he was blocks away from the battle and hopefully in the clear. He strapped Cap's shield to his back and Taskmaster's knock-off version to his arm. They were still heavy, but much easier to carry this way.

He started to hurry to Ethan's – wanting to get there before Ripper arrived – when he heard a scream, and a familiar one at that. Old instincts had him rushing to help even though he knew his entire plan relied on him knowing when Giles broke the spell. With the rings' help he quickly reached the source of the screams and found Cordelia being chased by something large and hairy. He stepped out of the shadows and slammed Taskmaster's shield into its face, knocking it off its feet and causing it to fall to the sidewalk, just as a soldier fired a quick burst into the air to scare it off.

Cordelia froze as she saw the two Xanders. "What?!"

"Go with him," Xander told her, as he realized it was still early and he'd been rushing for no reason. "He can keep you safe."

He ignored the two and started heading for Ethan's once more, while trying to recall if there were any other targets of opportunity he could hit before Giles reached Ethan's. He only had to stop to rescue someone half a dozen times more before he himself reached the costume shop and was relieved to find that Giles had not yet arrived. Both the rings' AIs informed him he couldn't summon their batteries when he tried and the yellow ring was unable to make a copy of itself, while the green one could. He'd forgotten Sinestro was so paranoid. Still, he'd only hoped to get one ring anyway and there was no guarantee his plan was going to work.

It took another ten minutes of waiting before Giles pulled up in his 'classic' car with Willow the friendly ghost walker and went inside. After the ghostly Willow fled to rejoin the gang, Xander took a chance and phased through the wall to enter the shop.

"This is who I am now!" Giles growled at the chaos mage.

Xander tuned out the pair of Brits and looked around, emptying the cash register while keeping an eye out for Giles to make a move towards the bust of Janus was. Seeing a display for various card games, he recalled how popular they'd become and how expensive the cards got so he quickly pilfered the lot of them as well. Xander noticed Giles finally enter the back room, so he quickly used the two main rings, focusing everything on shielding.

Giles threw the bust at Ethan and it exploded with a flash of light, breaking the spell and sending out a wave of energy.

Xander's energy shield popped like a soap bubble.

"Bastard!" Giles cursed when he saw that Ethan had escaped while he was blinking the spots from his eyes.

"Fuck!" Xander cursed, as his mental connections to both rings vanished and the weight of the shield on his back dropped to almost nothing.

"Xander?" Giles asked.

"Yeah," Xander agreed, taking off the plastic replica of Captain America's shield and reverently setting it on the counter. He brightened up as he noted that Taskmaster's shield hadn't reverted to plastic and the copied ring gleamed softly on his finger.

"I thought you were with Buffy," Giles said, embarrassed that a student had seen him like this.

"I am," Xander assured him, mentally connecting to the temporary ring and finding he had a 2.5 percent charge and a month to use it before it would disintegrate.

"Buffy is here?" Giles asked, confused.

"No, she is with Xander, Angel, and Cordelia; dealing with a bunch of crying children," Xander told him.

"But you're here, and what about Willow?" Giles asked.

"Willow is back in her body half-way 'cross town, and I am in two places at once," Xander told him.

"How?"

"Chaos," Xander told him, finding a sleeping bag behind the counter and stealing the candy displays.

"There are two of you right now?" Giles asked.

"That's correct," Xander assured him while looking for anything else worth stealing and finding a leather duster he liked.

Giles took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose while Xander vanished into the back to go through Ethan's personal stuff. "How are we going to handle this, and what are you doing?"

"We are going to claim I'm my identical twin that a paperwork fuck-up sent to an orphanage; and I am robbing Ethan," Xander explained, pulling a steamer trunk out of the back room and dumping out several drawers so he could make more room for various things. "My name will be Alexander S. Harris, but my friends call me Ash. Grab any boots you see in a size eleven, I'll need everything."

"That is... workable," Giles said. "Do you have a place to stay while I get the council to set this up?"

"I know a hacker or two who can handle it and I have a distant cousin who lives in town I can stay with," Ash assured him. "I'll let you know if there's anything I need help with."

"So, I'll see you tomorrow morning then, when we all meet up to report tonight's events?" Giles asked.

"Sure," Ash agreed, "but first I need a ride to my cousin Ted's place." He smiled as he ran his thumb over his temporary Green Lantern ring, the most advanced AI on the planet.

Typing By: Ordieth