Phoning it in 12

"Ready?" I asked.

"Nope," Dawn replied shaking her head. "Too excited, I need to pee," she said.

"Down the hall, it's clearly marked," I assured her.

"Thanks!" Dawn all but sprinted from the room.

Chuckling to myself I walked to the other side of the room and opened a window. "Passenger Pigeon," I muttered while shifting shadow to grab one and release it out the window.

Murphy is a lot more skilled at shifting shadow than I am and that stings the pride a bit, so I figured I'd get a little practice in.

"Spotted owl," I said as I switched focus and smoothly pulled an owl out of the shadows and released it out the window.

I get a nice rhythm going, pigeon, release, breathe, owl, release, breathe, repeat.

I didn't realize I had been doing anything different until I'd almost been pulled out the window I'm leaning out of, as a brightly feathered and highly vicious velociraptor, about the size of a large turkey, tried to claw my face off. I managed to shove it away from me with only light scratches, thanks to my innate toughness, but my shirt was shredded. I quickly shut the window, so it can't get back in, as we are on the first floor.

"What happened?" Dawn demanded as she checked me for wounds, concerned.

"I was practicing my bird calls when I somehow went from pigeons and owls to condors and dodos before calling for a velociraptor," I replied, removing my shredded shirt and wadding it up to throw in the trash.

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Xander and Buffy stare accusingly at Willow, Buffy having wrestled the mic from her hands as Xander had yanked the cord from the PA system.

"OK, I didn't think that through," Willow admitted.

"We probably should have left it at pigeons and owls," Xander admitted.

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I opened my backpack and pulled out a clothes' magazine.

"Going shopping?" Dawn asked, wondering what I was doing.

I opened it to the boys' section and found a nice blue casual button-up with short sleeves. "Nothing up my sleeves," I told her with a grin, wiggling my fingers before reaching into the magazine and pulling out the shirt. "Ta Da!"

Dawn stared at me wide-eyed, in shock for a second before begging, "Please tell me I can learn that!"

I paused as I put on my shirt and considered that. As the local version of the Pattern she probably could pull off something similar, or failing that I could give her the ability to shift shadow. "Maybe, I'm not sure," I admitted. "I'm pretty sure I can teach you one of the two ways I have for doing that. I'll just replace your wish for money with that one, since you can easily pull out handfuls of gold coins at a whim with it."

A loud squawking came from outside.

Dawn turned to look and I shook my head. "You really don't want to see that."

"See what?" she asked.

"The dodos going extinct again," I replied.

"OK," she agreed, confused.

"Sooo… how about we go back to powering you up?" I suggested.

"I'm ready," Dawn said intently, closing her eyes and bracing herself.

"What are you doing?" I asked, trying to sound confused and not snicker as I teased her.

"Erm… getting ready?" Dawn offered, opening her eyes.

"Ready for what?" I asked, pursing my lips and staring at her closely. "I'm just empowering you, not anything… kinky."

"What?! No!" Dawn flushed bright red. "I just thought it would be inten… I mean painful!"

"It doesn't really feel like anything," I told her. "Well… it feels a bit draining on my end. I suppose if I do enough I might feel tired enough to roll over and go to sleep."

"I… you're messing with me, aren't you?" Dawn said with a sigh, making me burst out laughing.

"A little," I admitted, "but you seriously looked like you were bracing yourself to lose your virginity, not gain powers."

"I am so glad Buffy didn't see that," Dawn grinned, "she'd never let me live it down, but seriously I thought there would be a bunch of pain or something."

I bopped her on the nose, pouring almost all the energy I had available into empowering her, including a large chunk of Mana as I find and connect a shadow to her. "Done," I said with a yawn.

"I can reach into magazines now?" she asked excitedly.

"What? No," I shook my head. "I activated your portal abilities and connected you to your own little world. I'll need some rest before I can do the magazine thing."

"OK," Dawn said, calming down. "So, how do I work it?" she asked, getting excited once more.

"The simplest way to start would be to use an existing doorway and simply concentrate on the door opening to where you want to go rather than where it actually leads," I explained.

"That I can do," Dawn said excitedly as she leapt to her feet and ran to the door of the room. With a big grin she put a hand on the door knob, concentrated, and pulled it open, revealing a shower room filled with steam and over a dozen naked soapy Xanders.

I slam the door shut and turn to stare at the drooling Key to this part of the multiverse. "Think 'in' universe," I tell her. "Always think in-universe; world-hopping is tiring and can be dangerous."

Dawn yawned loudly and looked really tired, but she's still grinning.

I sighed and guided her towards the center of the room, shoving a table into shadow and summoning a bed in its place. I was trying for a nice simple four poster type and instead got a heart-shaped, gaudy little number, that looked like it came from a Vegas honeymoon suite. Dawn flopped down on it, already asleep as I sighed once more and tried to make her comfortable.

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"Why is there a shower room filled with naked… yous?" Buffy demanded, trying not to blush at the images in her head.

"How should I know?!" Xander exclaimed. "Merlin said 'in-universe' so maybe Dawn can open portals out of our universe."

"And she chose one of – OK, stupid question," Buffy stopped herself.

The pair turned to Willow to see if she had a comment but she appeared to be busy archiving the video footage they'd recorded.

"I wonder why you have pyrokinesis," Buffy said, changing the subject.

"I don't know, but being able to go all Drew Barrymore on vamps is going to be loads of fun," Xander said.

"E.T.?" Buffy guessed.

"Firestarter," Xander replied. "Based on the Stephen King novel."

"Carrie?" Buffy tried.

"Like that, but with flames rather than telekinesis," he agreed.

"Hope I can use telekinesis to put out fires," Willow said.

"Point," Xander replied, recalling how often Charlie's abilities had gotten out of control. "Hopefully I'll have something more like Johnny Storm or Pyro."

"You'd burn all your clothes off," Willow said, making Buffy snicker. "He's doing the bird thing again."

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I was paying a lot more attention to what I was doing this time, as I pulled birds out of shadow and released them. I know I was being silly and I could just increase my skill by using my ability to increase powers, but I couldn't help it, Merlin had an ego, and Murphy's incredible skill with what should be Merlin's natural talents, stung a little.

I moved on to parrots, just to add some color and give me another aspect of shadow shifting to work on. As I focused on color-coded parrots, I heard a voice whisper, 'Kiwi'. I turned and looked around the room, but Dawn was still asleep and no one else was there.

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"He noticed," Xander said as Willow set down the PA mic.

"Aye aye, Captain Obvious," Buffy said, snapping off a salute.

Xander snickered. "The sarcasm is strong with this one, I am corrupting her nicely."

"I'll have you know I was sarcastic long before I met you," Buffy argued.

"It probably wasn't as dorky though," Willow pointed out.

Buffy's eyes widened. "You are corrupting me!" she accused the pair.

"Aye aye, captain," Willow replied, snapping off a salute.

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I was knocked half a step backwards as the velociraptor leaped on my back through the open window. I spun around and punched him back out of it, but my shirt was shredded once more and it looked like Dawn was waking up. I quickly closed the window and shoved the torn shirt into shadow, without removing it this time. I Walked back over to my backpack and took out the Sears catalog.

Dawn looked at the bed she's on, glanced at my shirtless state and raised an eyebrow.

"Don't even start," I tell her. "Unless you want to discuss a shower room of naked Xanders."

"Can I at least ask why this bed?" Dawn got up, looking completely recovered even though it's only been a little over a quarter of an hour.

"Shadow shifting is less exact than reaching into a magazine, so what I get is a bit more random," I explained as I pulled out a green, short-sleeve button-up shirt to put on.

"Make sense," she agreed. "So, my medium is doorways?"

I shake my head and took a closer look at her. "Your medium is… mirrors. Doorways are just an easy shortcut to help you learn to open portals," I replied.

Dawn grabbed another slice of pizza and a soda. "Can you explain it all to me again? I think I'm missing some of the details."

"I haven't exactly given you a full rundown on all of the details, because I hadn't empowered you yet, which meant I was mostly guessing about how it would work out until I had done it and could take a look at you," I explained awkwardly and made a mental note to figure out an easier way to explain it in the future. "You can open portals to anywhere, but the further they are the more your aim will suck. The portal to the world of naked Xanders for instance, they could easily turn out to be vampire Xanders or cannibal ones who only see you as food, rather than the use you were no doubt thinking of."

"What?" Dawn asked horrified.

"I can't say that's what it is, I'm just saying that since you were reaching for a world that far away it is possible," I said, trying to impress her with how dangerous it was to open portals at random.

"Then what good is it?" Dawn asked, pouting.

"You can open a portal to anywhere on Earth," I tell her. "Here open the door again and think of your room."

"I'm still a little tired," she admitted, before downing her soda and letting off an impressive belch.

"Alright," I said, "but just so you know, in-universe portals are a lot easier to open. You'll be able to get to school in seconds by opening the door and portalling to the janitor's closet and get back home just as quickly."

"Or the mall, or Disneyland," Dawn said excitedly.

"Exactly," I agreed. "Hiding it is a lot harder, but luckily your transport medium will help with that."

"Mirrors?" she asked, just to make sure.

"Mirrors," I agreed, placing a hand on a whiteboard and showing off a little as I switched it with a large mirror in a single move. It's a bit draining, but I covered for that by grabbing a soda and taking a drink. I've never actually performed the technique before, no matter what my memories say, or it'd be easy.

"How does this help?" she asked curiously.

"Touch the mirror and try to see through it like it's a window," I ordered.

"OK, but I – our reflections are gone," Dawn said curiously.

"It's now a window into your personal shadow," I tell her, happy it worked as I thought it would, because a lot of what I'm doing is guesswork, but I seem to be lucky so far.

"And how does that help?" she asked.

"Because if you were on the other side you could make sure this side was empty before stepping through," I explained.

"They couldn't see me?" she asked.

"Not unless you made it a portal," I replied. "Traveling from one side of the mirror to the other is easy for you, just tap it while picturing it as an open window and climb right through. Since the other dimension is empty you can portal around to your heart's content."

"I can go to any amusement park in the world at any time!" Dawn said excitedly.

"Just remember time zones and surveillance cameras," I warn her, "because the Mouse does not like being cheated out of its admission fee."

"They have shuttles that run directly from local hotels to Disneyland, so I can pop into their bathroom and then catch the shuttle. Adds a little time, and some cost, but as we're rich it won't matter," she said.

"Good plan," I say, impressed with how fast she'd thought it up. "With enough experience using your power you'll be able to open portals anywhere, no doors needed and use mirrors to look through completely different mirrors. Not sure what other tricks you'll come up with, but I'm sure you'll come up with some."

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"With the right… incentive, Dawn could give us a lift to all sorts of places," Buffy said, picturing shoe sales in Milan and dress shopping in Paris.

"Incentive?" Willow asked with a frown, as she tried to think of what they could bribe Dawn with.

"Incentive," Buffy said meaningfully, catching Willow's eyes and gesturing towards Xander behind his back.

"I, I don't know," Willow said, biting her lip.

"There are computer and book sales the world over," Buffy said, racking her brain for something Willow could be tempted with. "Hacker conventions?"

"Vegas and New York," Willow said aloud as she recalled some scheduled real-life meetups that she would love to attend.

"What are you guys talking about?" Xander asked, realizing he had missed something.

"Oh, nothing," Buffy said. "I was just wondering if you'd like to go Paris or Italy with me."

"I'd love to," Xander said, perking up as he thought Buffy might finally be coming around to seeing him as more than one of the girls.

"Good, because there are so many place to shop I just don't know where to go first!" Buffy said, letting a little of her 'airhead cheerleader' persona leak into her voice.

"Y-yeah, sounds fun," Xander said with a grimace.

"Of course then that would leave Dawn all alone in LA…" Buffy said giving him a little pout. "I don't know if I could enjoy myself while worrying about her."

Xander leapt on that line with both feet. "Yes she would be, and she really should have someone go with her. Why don't I handle that so you can go have some fun?"

"That would be perfect, thank you for being so thoughtful," Buffy said, exchanging a grin with Willow.

Typing by: Jarreas