"So, this is your wand?"

"Buffy…"

"What!"

"Perhaps, we should wait till we get out of the center of Sunnydale before you try waving it around?"

"What?" Buffy smirked, "Afraid; I'll show you up and prove that magic can work just fine here on the Hellmouth?"

Giles groaned, "That is exactly what I'm afraid of – and I would like my home to remain in one piece, as in undamaged…"

"Ugh, spoilsport."

Buffy had been over for about an hour as Giles explained the basics of the Wizarding World. What happened to her as a child – if she actually was Lyra Black, that is, alongside Harry Potter – who apparently is her godbrother, which was some welcoming and less hard-hitting news to her…, she never had any cousins or other family members close to her age growing up and had always wanted one. So, the idea of a godbrother, a few months older than her – even though a stranger, left a bit of a nice feeling for the what may be and the what could be's.

"If you'd like, we can head to the area where we dropped the Headmaster, Aberforth, and Lupin off for their portkey last night to test some theories of how to unlock your magic, if still blocked?" Giles looked around, looking for his First Year's Charms book to bring along, "And if your magic isn't blocked, then we can maybe try a few entry-level spells."

"How would we know the difference between my magic being blocked or me just not being a witch?"

"Well, I suppose we won't... there are a few potions I could brew to see if there is still a block on you – granted, the ones I can think of from the top of my head have a brewing time of a one-week minimum from start to finish. And then, I'd have to make a trip down to LA to purchase the ingredients needed in the Wizarding Alley there since I don't have any potion ingredients here within my home – or up to the one in San Francisco, but that's a much longer drive..." He trailed off before snapping back to the present, "But first, let's see if your magic is even blocked, and then we can go from there."

Buffy shrugged with a nod of her head, "Eh, makes sense."

"Good."

"Wait...?" Buffy squinted her eyes at Giles, "You guys make potions too?" She grimaced, "Like scary big black cauldrons over a big fire in a small little hut – middle of the woods type of potions?"

"It is not like that Hansel and Gretel book Buffy – or that blasted movie Hocus Pocus you had me watch – we do not cook children in big black cauldrons in the middle of the forest!"

"But you do use big black cauldrons?"

"Yes, I mean no... – sometimes!" Giles stuttered out.

Buffy raised a single eyebrow at her Watcher, "Well, which is it?"

"Yes, we use cauldrons to make potions and healing ointments and such, but they are mostly all the size of a cooking pan you would use for cooking soup or pasta. Only some large potion brewing companies use larger cauldrons to make larger sums of the same potion at the same time, but that is beside the point, Buffy!"

"Huh, so you guys have big brand companies like we do here in the normal world?"

Giles sighed, "Yes, we have some..." Shaking his head – he was so not ready for all the silly questions he knew Buffy had in store for him over the next few weeks or months/years... "Are we set to head out?"

"Yep, yep, yep!" Buffy clapped, jumping up from her seat, grabbing her coat already making her way to the front door.

"Do wait a moment, Buffy!" Giles called as he gathered his wand and a couple of First Year spellbooks along with his jacket and keys.

But just as Buffy was about to open the door, Xander and Willow beat her to it. Opening and barging on through – all three jumping back from each other, startled at almost ramming into one another.

"Woah! Where's the fire Buffster?" Xander asked the two.

"Oh…" Buffy faltered, looking back to Giles, who had sat his books and wand down on the side table next to the front door as he continued to shrug on his jacket. "Ahh….?"

"We called your house Buffy, and your mom let us know you were here at Giles's," Willow answered as she closed the front door behind her, "And since Xander has already finished his odd jobs for the day – "

"Another $75 for the 'fix Xander's piece of crap' car, in the bank – otherwise known as, the shoebox underneath my bed..."

"Yea," Willow nodded her head eagerly, "And with school picking back up this Thursday, we were thinking maybe we could go to movies or down to the boardwalk and check out the venues since we haven't been in a while before hitting The Bronze later?"

"Because when are we never not down for The Bronze?" Xander added, his hands resting on his hips, nodding his head as if agreeing with himself.

"Oh," Willow paused, looking at both Buffy and Giles, seeing the keys in Giles's hand, "Wait, are guys heading somewhere?"

"Actually, yes, we were just – "

"Oh, look!" Xander laughed, interrupting Giles, "A fancy-looking stake!" Reaching and picking up Giles's wand, fake stabbing the air as if a vampire were there, ignoring Giles, who was asking him to set it down and not to touch it.

What happened next threw everyone off.

A gust of wind shot from the wand sending Buffy, Giles, and Willow all to the ground in a heap; all caught off guard. The few things Giles had in his entry hall went flying about – scattering and plummeting to the floor, as well as a few loose leaf pages now slowly drifting around the room, leisurely floating their way to the floor to join everything else.

"I swear, I didn't do it!" Xander shouted, dropping the wand like a hot potato, taking a step back from it.

"Woah!" Willow's hand cautiously hovered over the wand that had rolled near her… she was hesitant to touch it after what just happened with Xander – but something was itching within her to pick it up and give it a swish, almost like a spidey-sense. She ignored the warning call from Giles and grasped the black-colored stick, moving to sit on her knees, swooshing the wand just as the fairy godmother in Cinderella did.

A bang was heard, and Willow was knocked back onto her ass by an unknown force – eyes blown wide, staring at a fist-size dent now smashed into Giles's coat closet directly across from her. Looking almost as if someone had kicked the door with the heel of their boot in anger, splintering the wood but not entirely breaking through it.

"Well," Giles groaned, lifting himself slowly from his foyer floor, straightening his skewed glasses, snatching his ebony Hippogriff Talon core wand back before any more accidental damage could be done to his home. "I suppose that defeats needing to follow the laws and the national security nonsense."

Buffy whipped her head towards her Watcher, "No fair!" She huffed, "They got to touch the magic wand, and I didn't!"

"So, let me get this straight," Xander began as he pushed his head between the two front seats of Giles's tiny town car, Willow right beside him, eagerly pushing her head between the two seats as well, not wanting to be left out of the conversation. "You're a wizard with magical powers from a different dimension. And Buffy is the long-lost daughter of some guy you used to go to magic school with, in some hidden magic castle, in northern Scotland – and her magical grandfather –"

"Great-grandfather!" Willow eagerly corrected.

"Right," Xander nodded his thanks, "So, Buffy's magical great-grandfather showed up along with her magical great uncle – who was your Headmaster at this secret magic school... And with them, was also her magical godfather, who also went to this magic-hidden-castle-school with you..., and this all happened on patrol last night?"

"Ah, yep," Buffy smacked her lips together, "Sounds about right."

Willow pouted, "Well, thanks for the phone call to fill us in on all of this!"

"Sorry, Wills…" Buffy grimaced. Of course, she wanted to call and spill the stitch to the two of them, but Giles had made it clear that if they weren't magical, they couldn't know – granted she had been thinking of ways to spill the news to them accidentally, so they'd be able to know...she just hadn't gotten that far yet.

"It's not a different dimension Xander," Giles sighed. He had already explained this to Xander three separate times since the four of them loaded into his car twenty minutes ago. Giles swore the boy's selected hearing was going to be the death of him someday! "It's the same dimension and world as the very one we are currently in, only hidden away from non-magical people from seeing or entering without assistance from a wizard or witch."

Xander shrugged, a blank look on his face, "Same thing."

Giles inhaled heavily, "No, actually, it is not Xander." They were now all on their way to the abandoned factory located on the outskirts of Sunnydale – the plans of just taking Buffy to try and explore her magic, now turning into taking all three of the teens to the factory to test things out... He needed to know for certain if Xander and Willow were also magical, and if so, why did MACUSA overlook them…? Could it be that the Hellmouth underneath Sunnydale affects core magic welders so strongly that even muggleborns are not detected or noticed by the American Ministry? And if that is the reasoning, how many more of Sunnydale's 83,000 residents have been overlooked by MACUSA?

"Why do all the exciting things happen when Xander and I aren't there?" Willow wondered out loud. Buffy glanced back at Willow with a raised eyebrow, "Well, it's true!"

"So that was your magical wand, huh, G-man?"

"Yes, it was."

"So, does that make me a wizard or warlock, too, then? Or do I need to have some sort of introduction into this 'secret world' to become one? If so, want to be my recommendation letter guy Giles, ya know to give me a leg up on getting in?"

"You can't just become one Xander," Giles felt so out of depth; it was one thing having to explain all this to Buffy after last night, but now this – explaining a world with some very outdated laws that he was barely apart anymore… "You have to be born with core magic to be a wizard or witch in my world."

"Oh." Xander felt a little dejected.

"However, my wand should not have reacted to you or Willow… wands never respond to muggles."

Willow leaned further forward, "What's a muggle?"

"Apparently, it's a non-magical person!" Buffy answered for Giles.

"Funny sounding word…" Willow paused, looking back at Giles again, "So does that mean Xander and I were potentially born with this core magic then?"

"It is possible," He gave a single nod.

"How does that happen?" Xander questioned, "I mean, I'm about 99% percent positive both my parents are not magical!"

"Maybe you're adopted, like Buffy?" Willow said playfully, nudging him in the side – Xander gave her the stink eye for even suggesting it.

"No, no…, a child can be born with core magic to non-magical parents, which would make them a muggleborn –"

"Muggleborn!?"

"Oh, for the love of Merlin…"

"All right, Buffy, you're up first – now do exactly want I instructed you to do, yes?" Giles was standing beside Buffy. Xander and Willow were just slightly behind them as Giles held his wand out in front of him, demonstrating again what to do with the wand once it's been handed to them. "I want you to be careful, though. We are far enough from the center of the Hellmouth, where its energy shouldn't have as much of an effect on our magic. Meaning, our magic is no longer as suppressed as it was inside my home and because of that, can create a lot more damage if being careless and rash."

"Right," Xander nodded eagerly, "Damage, careless, rash – not good!"

"No biggie," Buffy nodded, stepping up, "Point, then swoosh and flick."

"And remember, Buffy, we do not know if your magic is still blocked or not," Giles reminded her as he handed his wand over to her. "So concentrate, and keep your mind focused on just the wood crates there, and don't feel dejected if nothing happens at first, it's only our first test to see if there's still a block."

Buffy nodded, gripping the ebony wand in her hand, testing its weight, wrapping her fingers firmly around the handle of it. She was nervous, not knowing if she wanted to be a witch or to stay as normal as the chosen one could stay. If she did, have magic – then that might actually mean she was Lyra Black – and knowing who she was born as..., who her biological family may be, and some of them still being alive, it still overwhelmed her with nerves and uncertainty.

"Actually," Buffy took a step back, shifting her weight feeling the nerves begin to build up, "How about Willow or Xander give a go first?"

Giles understood the hesitance and softly took the wand from Buffy's hands and handed it to Willow's impatiently awaiting hands. He knew Buffy was still trying to process everything – so much had been thrown at her in the last twenty-fours alone, and he couldn't fault her for being unsure of it all, "All right, Willow, just as I told Buffy, you need to concentrate."

"Yep, totally got it! And totally ready to see if I'm a wand welder witch – possibly born with magical powers!" Willow was practically dancing in spot in excitement. "Woooahh!"

"Willow," Giles snapped his fingers in front of her face, gaining her attention back from Lala world, "I need you to stay focused and aim for the trash barrel."

Willow apologized, nodding her head, before slowly lifting her arm and swooshing the wand, pointing it in the general direction of the trash barrel she had been instructed to aim for. There was a loud bang-like explosion the second Willow flicked the wand. But instead of it being the trash barrel as she had hoped – it was; instead, a cluster of trees ten or so feet behind it, the group of them were now splintered with big gushes of wood missing from their trunks.

"Well," Giles tilted his head, "Aim is slightly off, but that comes with training… But no doubt in my mind that you indeed are a core witch, Willow."

"Really?" Willow gushed, trying not to jump in spot with glee, "But how can we know for certain? What if it's just the Wiccan magic I've been learning that is doing all that and not the core magic?"

"The wand – would not have responded to your touch if you were a muggle, Willow. And the wand has responded to you twice now." Giles reassured her, "Wands have magical cores within them as we wizards and witches do, and they do not respond to those without magical cores. So, even a bad response from a wand means a good thing when confirming someone is magical."

"Heh, me, a witch!" Willow cooed, "Not a boring old muggle…, woah go me!"

Xander snorted at his best friend, "Yea, yea, you non-muggle! Let us other hopeful non-muggles have a go at it!"

"Geez, you never can let a witch have a moment, can you, Xander?" Willow joked back, handing the wand back over to Giles, who now held it close to his chest as Xander held his own hand out to take the wand for a try.

"Come on, G-man, I promise I'll be careful!"

Giles gave Xander one more firm look before slowly handing the wand over. They all watched as Xander confidently flicked the wand - the trash can's inside lit up with high intense flames – the fire thankfully being contained in the metal barrel, but it was fierce and hot – they could feel the heat from where they were all standing, thirty or so feet away. Giles quickly took his wand back, flicking it once – water now shooting out of it and the fire quickly being put out before it overtook the trash barrel and became an actual issue.

"All right!" Xander jumped, fist pounding the air, "So, that makes me magical, doesn't it, Giles?"

Giles nodded, watching the gray smoke seep out from the barrel from what was left of the fire, "Yes, it does appear that way, Xander."

"Yes!" Another first bump in the air.

Giles turned away from the celebrating Xander and Willow towards Buffy. "Are you ready now, Buffy?"

Buffy inhaled deeply, swallowing that breathe hard, nodding her head and taking a step forward, reaching her arm out to retake ahold of the wand.

She again tested the weight of the wood in her hand, letting her fingers adjust around the handle. There was a sense of comfort she felt with the thin wood in her hand, and that scared her at how natural it felt to hold a piece of wood like a wand – and not a stake. Taking another step forward, Buffy raised her arm to chest height, hand shaking slightly with nerves, before finally biting the bullet and snapping her wrist.

Aiming for the four wooden crates that had been stacked up not too far from the trash barrel.

The first two crates shot into the air, maybe twenty or so feet, exploding into pieces as they did, flying in all different directions. The bottom two burst into instant flames, much like the intense fire Giles had just put out from Xander's try – this fire shooting up into the air, gaining steam as it burned all the wood pieces it could get its growing flames onto.

The wand was still vibrating in Buffy's hands, humming into her palms as if saying 'welcome back'. It shook her when Giles took the wand back – she didn't want to let it go just yet – it felt nice in her hand, humming against her palm. Giles nodded at her, acknowledging that her magic was, in fact, not blocked, before walking towards the still-burning fire, instantly putting it out, so it couldn't spread to the grass that led to the forest behind it.

"Dang Buffster…" Xander whistled as he walked closer to the destroyed crates, "You even took a huge chunk of the asphalt out that was underneath the crates!"

"I did?"

"Sure did!"

"Huh…, go me?" She shrugged meekly – she was feeling overwhelmed again.

Only Giles noticing the conflict fighting within her.

"So, what happens next, Giles?" Buffy asked, feeling a bit small and unsure of things.

"Well, I suppose, I will need to send a message to my former Headmaster to ask just that myself… for I am not entirely certain where to go from here." He frowned a little, "Buffy was the only one I had planned on testing for magic after the events and knowledge gained last night – but you two – " He gestured his head to Willow and Xander, "You two are a complete shock to me." He took his handkerchief out, wiping the few ashes from the fire's that stuck to his glasses. "For MACUSA to miss one muggleborn student in a general area, that may be able to be explainable – but two muggleborn's in the same general area… it makes me wonder if there are more?"

Willow frowned, "More?"

"Yes, more muggleborn's within the borders of Sunnydale."

Xander snorted, "Well, we have lived on the Hellmouth our whole lives, and if it affects your magic Giles, it wouldn't be all that shocking for it to affect a little kid's magic then…"

Willow chewed her lip in agreement, "I mean, it is Sunnydale..."

"Oh, the joy of living on a Hellmouth!"

Thoughts and feelings on it? How do you all feel about the direction of the plot so far?

Once we hit 15 member reviews for chapter 7, I will then post chapter 8!

So... review!