Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy:tVS or Angel:tS. The characters and situations of those shows are copyrighted to Mutant Enemy and/or associates. Any other TV-show or Movie being taken advantage of here is also copyrighted to someone other than me.
I, however make no money out of this and no malice is intended. I am also very poor and suing me would therefore be completely pointless, not to mention petty, as imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
I absolutely do not in any way with my writings aim to say that any of the actors portraying the characters are either straight or gay or indeed any other way than that which they were born. I write fiction and writing fan fiction means that I base my writings on fiction and nothing else.
Claimer:All original characters and situations not recognized as any other copyrighted creation belong to me and thus are copyrighted to me. Since I however am not a hypocrite you are free to use them or copy my plot etc as you please in your own fanfiction as long as you make clear that these are not your creations. The poetry is likewise mine and may not be used without express statement about who wrote it, therefore e-mail me and I will give you my real name and permission if you wish to use it for some non-monetary reason.
A/n: First time writing fanfiction. Just so you know. I'd love some feedback, but flamers come on. I get enough crap in my e-box as it is.
This will contain SLASH. That is homosexual relations, for those of you who didn't know. If you can't dig that, go someplace else please or read this to expand your horizons, but don't go badmouthing to me cause I ain't interested!
This will probably contain situations which are Fan Rated for Mature Persons. I choose to point this out to be on the safe side.
I am however Swedish and we are much more liberal in my country which is why I may be screwing up with the ratings. In Sweden adult movies are for 15 year olds and up because 15 is the legal age for having sex or going to jail. This applies to both hetero- and homosexual situations. However I have chosen the higher ratings here because I believe this is considered the generic ratings. If the ratings could be lower, please let me know. (But not before an actual situation as mentioned above comes into play.)
That being said, what I mean with this rant is that there will be violence, cussing, sex and mayhem in this story and angst, cuz I do love my angst.
This will contain PLOT. That means that there will actually be a story and not just the words mentioned above. If you don't like that, move on with my blessing. Sometimes you just want something simple, I respect that.
A warning for those of you who are rabid fans:
I am bad at cannon. I also like to mess with cannon. At no point can you presume that what happened in the shows are what happened in the past of this story. Mostly yes, but sometimes I will twist things and not comment on it. Pay attention to what I am writing, often you will find an explanation somewhere within to the changes. However, as I said before, I am bad at cannon and I admit it, though I play with cannon as a rule some things may not be intentionally different from the series, therefore if something is bothering you –let me know.
All chapters are so far un-beta'd. No one has beta'd for any of my writings as of yet. Do you wish to change that fact? Send me a note.
Summary: Xander's downplayed himself too many times so now people have a hard time trusting his abilities. A fact that makes a certain Balance Demon a tad bit worried and that leads us to the situation below.
All right, I'm done covering my ass etc now so on with the show.
An Argument
"The powers are closing in on me
an army unlike anything before
The walls around humanity collapse
the Earth is sundered to the core
No one will sing of the last of all wars
where humanity took its final stand
When the ultimate battle is over
there is naught left but stars and sand"
/Extract from the poem Harmageddon
"Well kid. We sure as hell messed this one up. Didn't we?"
Xander turned his head around slowly even though the voice had come from his blind side. He had realised who was talking almost before the first word had been said. He had felt the Balance Demon's presence the moment he had appeared and had pinpointed the presence and the voice to one messenger from the Powers That Be. For some reason he wasn't shocked by the sudden appearance, why though, he couldn't fathom, perhaps all that had happened had just jaded him. Perhaps Caleb was on to something and he really did see things. Right this moment he didn't care which, cause the Demon was absolutely right, they had screwed up, badly, he just didn't see how to fix it, not anymore.
"What do you want, Whistler?"
"Well, I want to pummel you and I want to scream at you and maybe send you a century or two to hell just to beat some fucking sense into you, but mostly I want to know if you see any way to fix this mess you put us in."
Now Xander turned his whole body and stared the ageless being straight in the face.
"What the hell are you talking about! Are you saying this whole mess is my fault? I'm just normal guy, remember?"
The demon snorted at that.
"Yeah right, like you were ever fucking normal. How many sixteen year olds do you know of who would and could drag a master vampire to a possible final death at cross point? You were supposed to stay on that path junior. Not play security blanket to the slayer! Damnit, so many times when we got a glimpse of the real you. The fucking warrior we were waiting for and every goodamned time you take care of the immediate worry and then revert back to that godforsaken goof persona. What were you thinking!"
Xander clenched his jaw.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"The hell you don't kid. What the fuck was wrong with you, you suppressed every instinct you had except to love and somewhat protect. Was it your childhood? No. Sure you and Willow got a bad deal in the parents department, but it could have been a whole helluva lot worse. So was it the infatuation with the slayer? Christ she really screws up things that one. Well. What the fuck was it that made you play not even second but last fiddle all the time!"
The Balance Demon looked about to blow with the amount of rage he had gathered, apparently over the years.
"Look Buffy was the slayer, it was her gig."
"The slayer is a foot soldier and you know it. She wouldn't have made it two days without you. And she got an ego a mile wide. Don't deny it."
Xander was about to snarl something back. A protective instinct, habit really, but he kept himself in check and thought back.
Saving her life two days after she came to town.
Hearing that she was a cheerleader at her last school and queen bitch at that.
He remembered a brief flash of thought he'd had about the perils of taking a young girl who already had delusions of grandeur and putting her on a piedestal. Telling her she is 'the chosen one'. Deferring to her in all matters, even when her tactical reasons were more like 'me slayer, kill now'.
"Yeah well. She was a kid. She needed a friend. Someone to lean on."
"A friend, sure maybe. There were others who could do that though. You left Angel as the only one she felt she could trust with her back."
"I helped."
"Yeah, kid. You did. But not as much as you could have and you never made her see what you did for her, for chrissakes you hid it if you could."
"That was later. She needed to feel secure in her place as Alpha."
"But she wasn't, was she? Not really. You suppressed the Hyena within deliberately so you wouldn't challenge her. She needed to be challenged! Christ do you even know how much power your soul carries to be able to completely suppress a primal spirit!"
"She was young and afraid. She needed a friend, a protector of her heart. And what the hell are you going on about anyways. You sent her Angel, REMEMBER!"
"Yeah kid, I did. And I should have tried to prepare him a bit better. Maybe. But you were there when he arrived."
"I was sixteen and untrained, what do you think I should have done. Staked him?"
"NO! I sent him. You alienated him."
"What the hell does that have to do with anything? I was trying to keep him away from her."
"By acting like a jealous teenage boy?"
"No, yes. I was her friend. She was supposed to see reason."
"So you tried to make her see you. You idiot. You had already buried yourself with those masks you wore. Why the hell didn't you just talk to Angel instead?"
"She was my friend, she was even younger than me. I was trying to protect her. He shouldn't have gone near her, how the hell could I talk to him, he was over 200 year old, a master vampire, he SHOULDN'T HAVE GONE NEAR HER!"
"He was lost and confused and alienated. She seemed powerful. She was innocent. He thought she was the key to her redemption. He thought he was giving her what she needed. A mate."
"He was a vampire, she was a slayer what the hell was so difficult to comprehend!"
"He had a human soul and needed affection. He hadn't had a friend in centuries."
"So what? He couldn't be friends with us?"
"You were hostile almost from the start."
"He was a cryptic asshole and almost jumped at her from the get go."
"It was his first gig as a hero. He actually tried to stay aloof. Didn't work."
"Still not my fault, I was sixteen."
"So what! That's more or less adult and you know it. You had all your faculties. You could think for yourself. Loyalty is a virtue, but couldn't you have given the guy a break!"
"I…"
Xander sighed.
"I could have. I… He was a champion. I saw it. I saw his loneliness. I saw that she was a child in mind still and that he had been thrown into the champion gig. I just didn't think it was my place. I… Christ, you're right. I turned a blind eye. I chose to act like a normal teenager… Fuck, I don't know, they had all this destiny crap going on and I didn't like that and there was this whole thing with Jessie. I just sort of closed off there somehow, decided that I was gonna make everybody else happy, cause even if I couldn't be, they deserved it."
"You mindwarped yourself good kid.."
"Yeah, guess I did."
He saw more memories now. Flashes where he had squashed his original instincts in favour of protecting the hearts of others.
Letting loyalty be everything. Not giving Angel or Spike a chance because they were undead and related to Darla, because no one else really saw that no matter what else they were they were both still master vampires and because they both showed an unhealthy interest in the slayer.
Trying to cushion things for everyone. Letting Buffy spiral down to her queen bitch status once more. Letting Willow believe she was smartest, most powerful. Letting Giles be the strategist, the leader, the 'knowledge guy', when he was really just as screwed up as the rest of them. Being tension relief, thinking that that was what was missing, when in reality they all needed a real leader. Someone who saw things, someone who did what was necessary, someone…like the guy he could have been. Like the guy he was deep within. He had let his heart get the better of him, being too much of a white hat and not enough white knight. His head spun as thoughts, images came to his mind. Instances when he had seen, but chosen to ignore because of the heart.
He closed his eyes and thought about everything leading up to the closing of the Hellmouth. Activating all the slayers. Now acting like a carpenter/counsellor to a bunch of girls who should still be living normal lives. Seeing now, how this would, could end.
"Apocalypse?" He asked quietly while locking eye to eyes with the Balance Demon.
Whistler nodded sadly.
"End of the world as we know it. Return of the time of evil supreme."
"But we can stop it. We know. You're telling me about it."
"Kid I can't interfere like that."
Xander frowned.
"But you already have."
"I haven't actually told you anything about it. Other than that it can't be stopped."
"But it can, if you just tell me about it. We'll stop it, I'll stop it."
"Too late now, you can't take up your mantel now. They won't follow you. They will follow
them now and they will lose. You won't be able to work to your full potential before it's too late. You will head up the resistance later yeah, but it will be a guerrilla. The Earth will have fallen. You will fight against overwhelming odds. You will start something that won't see it's end for centuries, if at all."
Xander hadn't even noticed his eye tearing up.
"Fuck. I fucked up. What can I do to stop it Whistler?"
"Nothing kid."
"Nothing? Then why are you telling me this, are you just here to torture me. I'm sorry I screwed up ok! I wasn't the only one... Gods, it doesn't matter. I didn't know I was so important. If I was then why didn't I get a prophecy, why didn't I get some sort of guide, a kick in the right direction?"
"Cause you're the wild card, kid. We had no power over you. We weren't allowed to interfere with you, not like that. Not then, you had to make your own choices. You weren't our champion. You're the champion of life. You were supposed to be a player not to be played, but you chose to sit out the game and now everything is screwed up."
"Again. Why are you telling me this. If you can't interfere, why are you here?"
Whistler stared out into space and for a moment Xander almost thought that he wouldn't get an answer, then the balance demon spoke.
"Cause reality is going to hell in a hand basket and soon it won't matter anymore…"
The words caused a shiver to travel down the young mans spine, they sounded so final coming from this ancient being, not like when Giles made his 'dear lord' comment. This sounded much worse, much, much worse.
They both stood silent for a while contemplating the words that had just been spoken, then Whistler broke the silence once more with an almost nonchalant tone in his voice.
"Did you know that Angel is your true mate?"
"He what!"
Xander felt a wave of dizziness come over him.
He tried to deny what he had heard, but somehow these words broke through his protective barriers of denial. Everything coming to him, all the feelings, the hidden thoughts. Desires denied. Destiny defied. He grabbed the railing of the balcony he was standing on as his knees threatened to buckle.
"How…"
He asked, choking on tears.
"Why…"
"Birds and bees, kid. I'm sorry. I am to blame too, but I can't make other people's choices for them ya'know."
"I'm bi…"
"I know kid."
"I was in love with Jesse."
"And then you killed him? Christ kid, I know that must have messed with your brain. They wanted him as a whitelighter."
"They took him?"
"They…nudged him in that direction."
"They killed him!"
"No, no kid. They didn't they just…nudged…"
"They couldn't mess with me so they messed with my friend."
"No, he really was meant to be a whitelighter, that was his destiny. He's a good one too. One of the best. He's helped a lot of people. No one knew how you felt about him, that's the thing when you're off limits. We can't keep tags on you like that. That was a screw up by the powers. They shouldn't have taken someone so close to you if they wanted you to go their way... But ya know. He did have a destiny."
"Alright… But, fuck do you know how much that influenced my decisions? Bad tactical decision, I mean they must have known he was my friend. Yeah, they probably did. A friend, we all lose friends. So they didn't know we were more. Huh. Big fuck up."
"Yeah."
"Yeah. So…Bad luck all around."
"Yeah kid, I guess so."
"Now what? We wait for the end of the world?"
"We could do that. You could wait. You could fight and lose and fight again or…"
"Or?"
"You know kid. If I were you, I'd be pissed off at Angel for not recognizing you as a true mate. He should have, having the advantage of having a demon for a longer time. He shouldn't have squashed all his feelings for you. Trying to hurt you to make them go away. And you know I would be pissed at the slayer too. Laying her hands on what was yours by right. Belittling you, acting like a bitch. Taking your mate, your future adopted childe. Forcing you to abandon your pack. She's really screwed you over.
If I were you I'd be pissed at the powers for screwing up with Jesse. I'd be pissed at me for screwing up with Angel. And I'd wish for a way to send my soul back to that younger body. For a chance to make things right, for your sake. Showing them the real you, be the babysitter they needed back then. Taking revenge by being all that you can be this time. I mean come on aren't you pissed Xander? I know you've gotta be, cause I am and I haven't been screwed over nearly as much as you have. Don't you wish those things too?"
"Yeah."
Xander's eyes darkened. He wasn't as mad as everyone else as he was with himself, but there was definitely anger radiating from him.
"Yeah. I really wish I could do things over. get things right this time. Not let the powers poor decisions screw with me and everybody else. Then get my mate and my rightful place as Alpha. Me, not Queen Bitchy Buffy."
"Done."
He snapped around his head reeling from the sudden dimensional shift. Floating in the air behind him was no other than D'Hoffryn himself.
"Good luck kid. Having no humans around would seriously screw with my business and this way I get my Anyanka back."
A portal was opened beside him.
"How?"
"Bending the rules. Looping the loop. You're the only one who can do this, you're the only one without a destiny. You can shape it, shift it. Only you. When your soul goes through that portal, yes only your soul. Not the soldier part of you, that reality was created the night of Halloween. Not the Hyena, she is still in her cage in the past. You will need an animal or a demon or some other entity inside you to claim your mate though, remember that. Now as I said, when your soul goes through the portal this whole existence will disappear, all that has happened will be nullified. Time will not just be turned backwards, the weave itself will be shredded and remade. No one will know about this but you. Not even the powers. Don't spill the beans though if you can avoid it, don't know what would happen. Reality's tricky like that. You're a great actor, this will be the roll of a lifetime. Of all our lifetimes… The loop is only a loop as long as it goes in circles, remember that. Good luck Alexander."
"You got a full rewind kid, make the best of it."
Whistler's parting words were almost drowned out by the sudden sound of bells chiming and before he could say a word Xander could feel his soul leaving his body. He was warm and basking in light and then he felt nothing, saw nothing, until he opened his eyes.