AN: Sorry about having three interludes in a row before the last chapter, the last one was a something I had to do to keep getting my Beta to help me keep this one as error free as I can. Caritas redux also made things fit together better, I don't remember much about Wily's first appearance, I wasn't totally sure if it happened before or after Halloween, my first memory of him was in the episode that Kendra showed up. Plus Sephiroth got to have some fun causing havoc, and Spike's starting to worry.
But that chapter was basically setting things up for the next few, a way to keep things on track without people going "huh?" about what's happening.
Also as I said earlier, with Xanders personality change due to Sephiroth, the Creator changed Dawns history to give her at least a chance of being guarded by Sephy/Xander so she is a lot older than she was in the series, only a year younger than Buffy and had been living with her and Buffy's dad. Her dad's new girlfriend didn't like her so she convinced him to send Dawn to her mothers, and thus she made it to Sunnydale. And since it was only recently that she arrived, she has yet to meet Xander other than seeing a few photo's and the like, but that is about to change.
EverAfter-01-Hey, it's Surge, so it's not illegal, at least where I'm from. Thanks!
X-Over-At the moment timelines are getting twisted slightly, the Gentlemen won't like a town with Sephiroth, he's just as deadly without his voice as with it, and in the game he's immune to the spell that removes the voice, they get one lethal enemy just waiting to carve them into little pieces. Willow the Vamp could theoretically be made into a second willow with the right combination of spells, kill her and use Revive and suddenly a second Willow shows up, the other things I'll try to work into it, I missed the end of Angel due to scheduling problems so I didn't see much of Illeryia, but I liked Fred, and with Wolfram and Hart gone in LA, I'm not sure if she would show up in the first place.
Anime-Ronin-Yeah, Dru knows something, but other than a few glimpses of a mysterious figure comming, she doesn't know what, the Creator is shielding Sephiroth. He isn't planning world destruction, if anything I've noticed he's closer to a Centra than a normal person though, I didn't exactly plan it, but Gaia is the voice of Earth, well, she is Earth actually. And Spike is definately going to try to get out of this one, especially when he finds out who came into town and what else he caused all over the world.
Xander stood on the rooftops watching, the girl below seemed to know she was being followed, but the pack of vampires running after her as she moved was the only thing she could know was there.
What intrigued him was that she was carrying a stake, not a normal piece of gear, and was preparing for an ambush. He would let her plan and if it worked, leave her be, but he had to know how capable she was.
He moved like a cat across the rooftops as his mind analyzed the situation, he didn't have eye contact so he couldn't use a Scan spell, but he could watch and learn what she was capable of
She waited in a dead end, a stake in each hand in a low stance, ready to strike.
Sephiroths eyes moved around the corner to the enemies approaching the girl, he counted twenty-six vampires and at least one larger demon, they weren't taking chances for some strange reason.
He knew that even slayers wouldn't be capable of that fight on their own, but a smile spread on his lips as he reminded himself, that he was something far more deadly, he was Sephiroth, and to those who opposed him, he was death itself made flesh.
Freezing at motion, he waited a moment longer as lights flickered, jerking to see if it was a car nearby, but it was just a streetlight and he prepared to fight the foes below.
Then he pulled up the hood of the cloak he was wearing in the rain, it concealed his features save for his glowing eyes. With a well practiced motion he drew Masamune and drew a silver throwing knife as soon as his prey entered the alley.
He threw the long and slender blade as he leaped, the eighteen inch knife implanting itself in the back of the demons neck just as he landed, beheading five of the bloodsuckers with a simple arc of his blade.
Triggering Haste, he accelerated into a blur, striking faster than the eye could track as he leaped and twirled and spun as if it was a mere dance rather than a fight. His blade screaming through the air with a high pitched shriek of breaking the sound barrier.
Then he stopped, sheathing the blade as the vampires dusted all around him, well all save two of them.
A master vampire, who began to run for his life, and the minion who followed.
Sephiroth cast Slow on them and watched them trip as they misjudged their path.
"You do know that it is impolite to stalk a lady," he asked with venom in his tone as he drew a second knife and walked over towards them as they tried to crawl away.
"What are you?" the master screamed as they realized they had run into a wall, fear distorting their sense of direction.
"Ah, once again, you're asking the wrong question, I am only what I am," Xander said with a chuckle that portrayed not mirth but more seriousness than any death threats, "You should be asking what you can do to come out of this alive."
His glowing green eyes stared into the creatures that were squirming to get away from this creature that had eliminated the others.
"Or unliving as your cases may be," he said from under the cloak and cowl that hid his features save for his eyes, boots, and gauntlets.
"What do we have to do?"
"Well, I want you to spread the word, the Slayer and her friends aren't the only thing that's lethal in this town, and I have far less of discrimination when it comes to targets, I'm the new top of the food chain in town."
"Yes," the master yelled as he scrambled to his feet and ran for it, the minion starting to follow when the dagger was driven through its chest just below the collarbone and into the wall, sizzling coming from where the metal touched undead flesh.
Sephiroth chuckled as he drove it to the hilt into the leech, the point anchoring itself in the wall behind it as he cast a Silence spell on it before it could scream.
"Who...who are you?" a cautious voice said from behind him as he smiled to himself, realizing that the voice belonged to the girl.
"A friend," he said, a slight smirk crossing his shadow hidden lips as he remembered hearing about Buffy's first encounter with Angel.
He turned, their eyes meeting for a moment, but long enough for him to use a Scan spell, learning only a little about her.
"I don't need anymore friends," she spat at him, "I don't need any help either."
He chuckled at her anger, "I never said I was yours...Dawn."
"How...how did you know my name?"
"I know many things about this world and well, that is one thing that's for me to know and you to wonder about," Xander said as he cast a darkness spell, dropping his surroundings into the shadows for a moment.
When the spell ended, Sephiroth was gone, and Dawn Summers could only stare at the spot where the figure was with eyes wide and jaw dropped.
"And this guy just went poof and vanished with a flash of darkness," Dawn explained for the fifth time to the others sitting around the table in the library of the once more rebuilt high school. It was strange as it had already been demolished and rebuilt twice within nine months.
"And how many did you say he dealt with?"
"It looked like two dozen vampires and some sort of demon, I dealt with one vampire he left pinned to a wall with a strange knife that burned the vamp, I couldn't leave it like that, another he let leave with a message."
"What message?" Giles asked as Buffy almost choked when she heard her sisters estimate of how many the guy dealt with.
"Something about being the top of the food chain now, and that the Slayer wasn't the only predator or something in town, only he was less discriminate about his targets."
"You said something about knives," Willow said, still trying to put the pieces together.
"Here," Dawn said pulling the two weapons out, they were almost identical save for them being mirror images of each other, designed to be wielded together, one in each hand.
"Good lord," Giles commented, reaching out towards but not actually touching the weapons, "Mythril silver, these things must be worth a fortune."
"How did they affect the vamps then?" Buffy asked.
"From what's engraved on them, they have several runes for defense against evil forces as well as the things most likely have charms, blessings, and curses all over them, these daggers seem custom made, and I wouldn't put it past the maker to have the tools he used dealt with the same way, I don't see the harm in using them if you'd like to Dawn," Giles said as he picked one up and twirled it experimentally, "They seem like something that would be most useful to you, light and easily handled."
Whistler smirked, the winged one was better at the mysterious savior act then the vampire with a soul was. Only he was doing it for a reason, he had not revealed that he was there, only that something was helping on the side of light.
Glory, Spike, and Dru would be on their guard after the incident in the bar, hell, that was the most violent thing he'd seen since atomic bombs had been dropped, only then it was instantaneous, this was just shy of barbaric.
If what the kid said his costume was had been right, he was thankful the world was still in one piece. But then again, the guy didn't have either the Black or the White Materia, and hadn't shown any interest in causing hell on earth.
He was also thankful that the kid was still a neutral party, there would be no way in heaven or in hell that they could get a counter for that kind of power in a single being. Hell, even the First was heading for the hills the night he showed up and was still keeping his distance. Not to mention the Powers trying to take him out because he didn't fit their damned plan.
Glory was in a screaming mood after Spike and all the vampires he had gained control of ran for it, the one who brought the news had his head ripped clean off and thrown across the room to put a hole in the wall before he dusted.
She was screaming to her minions that she wanted the mortal who dared challenge her superiority dead.
Another thud and the head of one of her minions, a sickening looking fiend named Doc, appeared through the wall.
