Disclaimer: See Prologue.

A/N: There will be no humanization of the Key. I'm using several things that happened after Graduation in Buffyverse, but because of the altered timeline, they never did in this one. The Key is meant for locking Hell dimensions back up, but it can be used to unlock one as well, as in Season 5.

There will also be no smacking around of Loki. Any smacking around of Kinsey will happen after we deal with our Hellmouth problem. Here's your chance to vote on the Big Bad. Shall it be A)Kinsey and the NID? or B)Anubis? Vote in your review. (Hint, hint!)

I've been gone quite a while, and I apologize. I've been kind of distracted. Hope you enjoy this!

CHAPTER 10

It turned out that Loki had been so convinced of the primitive nature of humanity that he had completely underestimated their intelligence. Tac'an had told him, "Primitive is just the first step. Just because a baby can't walk, that doesn't mean they're stupid or deformed. After all, they have to learn how to walk, and they do that by observing. Humans are the same way. They observe the world around them, and they figure out what works. For some that leads to science. For others it leads to magic. For the best, it leads to both. That would be Willow."

In a universe without the constant struggle against demons and with the marriage to Oz to boost her confidence, Willow had blossomed into a very powerful Wicca, quite strong enough to deal with almost any mystical darkness that the world as it was could come up with. That would no longer be the case if they couldn't stop the thieves from opening the Hellmouth.

Hammond didn't know much about magic, but he figured it took a lot of concentration, so he assigned SG-1 and SG-15 to protect Willow and Giles while they worked. It was going to take magic to find the thieves, as Loki, in his arrogance, had not put a locator on the device or any of its components, which Thor had soundly rebuked him for. Of course, Oz came too, as moral support for his wife and as a gopher to make sure any items she and Giles needed would be in their reach. And Tac'an went for several reasons. First, because she wanted to be with her husband. Second, because if things got nasty with the thieves, having the Slayer there could only help matters. And third, if everything went south, they were going to need a Slayer to fight whatever came out of the Hellmouth.

Willow had tried working with covens in the past, but she had never been able to sync up with more than one or two people. One of the best had been a girl named Tara, but she had left Sunnydale quickly, something to do with running from her father. So Willow mostly worked alone, though she had told Giles that she was always on call if he needed her.

Giles had no innate affinity with magic, but he was a superb researcher, and the occult had always been of interest to him. In his capacity as Curator of the British Museum, he had a great deal of resources at his finger tips. He was a virtual walking encyclopedia on Wicca and Dark magic, and he had always been open-minded when it came to strange theories, which is what had endeared him so to Daniel Jackson. Giles had always told him, "Anything is possible. Never let the assumptions of others get in the way of your search for the truth." And Daniel had taken his advice to heart.

Talking with Giles, Tac'an found that a lot of the same creatures she had dealt with in her past did in fact exist here. Werewolves were around, their existence being the result of a curse rather than a demonic possession. Lycanthropy was a disease created by magic, one that in this universe had never infected Oz or the cousin who had infected him in the other. Ghosts and other kinds of spirits had a far freer hand here, and were far more common. Vampires were merely legend and had never actually been created because the demon within them had never come through from Hell to Earth, but Vlad Dracul had still existed, and his legend had caused the ironically accurate vampire myth to be popularized. Tac'an had even been able to find several of the more infamous vampires of her own acquaintance through history. Angel had been Darien O'Rourke and had never met Drucilla or William. Drucilla had been a famous seer. William eventually became a famous writer. Darien had lived his life, married and had a family, a total of twelve children, before his death of extreme old age in the early nineteenth century.

So, as they worked, Tac'an just smiled and let things develop naturally between the team members. They knew that she was from that parallel universe, but none of them had grasped yet that she had known them there. So if she just grinned when Xander started pestering Giles, only Jack noticed, and he kept his mouth shut. Giles had asked her all kinds of questions, but they had been about the demons she had faced, including everything from the Master to the Mayor.

Tac'an, SG-1 and SG-15 went into Willow's home first, making sure there were no nasty surprises waiting for her. They didn't have any idea what the thieves might have knowledge of, so they were on full alert. Tac'an had always been able to sense magic, though not as strongly as demons, and she knew Willow's magical "scent," for want of a better word. There was nothing in the house that wasn't Willow, so she added a "Clear!" of her own to the ones being shouted around her at Jack.

Thanks to Hecate Software, Willow was very well off, and it showed in the house she had bought when she and Oz had gotten married. Nothing about the house was really flamboyant, since that wasn't Willow. It was huge, but modestly decorated, all a sign of vast unflaunted wealth. She told the soldiers to make themselves comfortable and grabbed Oz, Xander and Tac'an to help her start turning down beds in the guest rooms. There were five such rooms, so everyone had to pair up, but they'd all had far worse accommodations in their lives, including Giles, who had lived out of a tent on many a dig site. He and Daniel paired up, Jack and Sam were in the next room, then Teal'c and Tac'an, Xander and Captain Finn, and Hicks and Michaels.

Jack and Sam didn't show it, but they knew that things would be strained come nightfall with having to share a very comfortable bed. But Tac'an came to the rescue. She pulled the both of them aside and took a paper out of her cammo jacket. "Okay, before he left the base last time, I had a discrete talk with the President. I was worried that they wouldn't let Teal'c and I go on any missions together because of us being married, so I asked him just how tight those fraternization regulations were. He promised me he'd look into it. Just before we left the base, this came through on my fax machine." She handed the paper to Jack. It bore the Presidential Seal and George W. Bush's signature.

The paper read:

Due to the nature of assignments in the Stargate project, this administration has deemed that certain regulations regarding fraternization should not apply to certain civilian and military personnel and can be disregarded. This includes all off-world teams, and will be maintained by this office, provided a certain level of discretion is maintained. So ordered by the President of the United States.

"Damn!" Jack grinned and passed the paper to Sam.

Once she'd read it through, Sam's grin matched Jack's and she hugged the stuffing out of Tac'an. "Thank you so much!"

Tac'an chuckled. "Hey, I didn't sign the paper. Make sure to send him flowers or something!"

Willow had two distinct work areas for magic, one in the sun, outside in her garden, and one in the dark, in the basement. She took Giles and Tac'an with her into the basement area to perform a location spell. since they were looking for an artifact and not a person, they knew that they would need to look for power traces, but that was really all they knew. It could be a long and difficult search. The thieves could be anywhere on the planet.

But surprisingly, to Willow and Giles anyway, she got a hit almost immediately. The spell formed an image in the air of what it had found, and Giles confirmed that it was the Nexus, the most powerful part of the device. "It's right here in Sunnydale!"

Tac'an snorted. Willow looked at her. "Sorry. It's just that almost anything mystical that has ever happened to me as Buffy Summers happened in this X-Files town. And I'll bet you anything I own I know where they've set up."

"Where?"

The campus looked just like she'd left it, minus certain obvious things, like the stage she'd never gotten to walk across, and the gigantic demonic snake. Principle Snyder was the exact same troll she remembered him to be, griping at Willow and Giles initially for bringing the soldiers into the school, then backing off rather quickly when Jack got in his face and told him to take it up with the US government. Tac'an spotted a few familiar faces as she walked down the halls toward the library, including the science teacher who had been eaten her freshman year and Jenny Calendar. She wondered if, after all this was over, if they survived it, she might introduce Jenny to Giles. They really had been cute together in an icky kind of 'kids can't appreciate adults in relationships' way.

Figuring that the thieves would need to perform their rituals in darkness, they talked Jack into allowing the two non-combatants to go first. Tac'an smiled at the familiar scent of the library, then approached the librarian. It was an older, slightly frumpy woman with graying hair. "Ma'am, have there been a lot of strange people coming through here lately? Besides us, I mean?"

"Yes." Flustered, the woman shook her head a bit before continuing. "Yes, there have been several young men in here, rather a lot lately, but I didn't think much of it. They're all three former students here, and I just assumed that they felt more comfortable studying here than any other library."

"Where do they usually go when they're here?"

"Up in the stacks."

"What are their names?"

"Warren, Jonathan and Andrew."

Willow came up behind them. "Oh, I remember those guys! they were all really solitary kinds, you know, geeks, as opposed to the far more social nerds."

Xander chuckled. "Nice distinction, Will."

She grinned at him cheekily.

The civilians, Xander and Tac'an all headed for the stacks, Xander sweeping the area first with his P-90 at the ready, before he let anyone else follow him. He called out a clear, and as other clears were heard throughout the library, Tac'an relaxed. "Okay, Will. You and Giles get set up. We'll get things ready out here." She left the Wicca in the stacks and went to where Teal'c was standing in the middle of the small library, next to the work tables. "Hey."

"All is well, Tac'an." And yet his face screamed that something was wrong.

"You sure about that? You look worried."

Teal'c nodded. "Yes. If this fails, forces even more dangerous than the Goa'uld, by hundreds of times,, will threaten this world. It will become a battle ground."

Tac'an nodded. "Yes it will. And the story of my life will be repeated, at least my early life, in thousands of young girls as the centuries progress. That's why we're here, to stop that from happening."

The big Jaffa looked down at his wife. "You would devote your time to the new Slayer, to training them and hoping that your training would prevent their deaths, at leas prolong their lives."

She frowned. "Maybe."

"I would miss fighting along side you."

Suddenly, Tac'an figured out what her husband was worried about. "You're afraid that being the Slayer would prevent me from being your wife. Don't. It's you I fight for now. I love you, Teal'c, more than anything or anyone else. I promise!" She smiled indulgently at him. "You're it for me, big guy." Then she kissed him passionately.

They were interrupted by the testy voice of the librarian. "Please! This is a school, not a motel!"

Tac'an giggled when Teal'c glared at the woman. Xander cracked, "Yes, mustn't scar the impossibly horny teenagers with the sight of a happily married couple actually kissing in a public place."

Oz said, "Yeah, 'cause marriage is such a bad thing."

Willow had come down from her work to grab something from her supply bag. "And married smoochies? Even worse."

Bouncing off of her friends in a familiar manner, Tac'an said, and there are so many teenagers around to witness them."

They had all kept a straight face, but then Jack had to put his own bit into the scene. "Besides, this room would make a lovely hotel suite. Some better furniture, a couple of beds, some curtains..." And every soldier in the room except Teal'c cracked up, along with Willow and Oz, and Giles, Daniel an Teal'c were all grinning. The librarian walked off in a huff.

Yay! This one's done. And don't worry. I have at least one more chapter written. This thing isn't over by a long shot. Don't forget to vote for the Big Bad!