AN: Some answers given, some not, and a big question left. Well, a big question and, I think, one more chapter.

Chapter 6

Xander watched, in his frozen state, as Angel verbally ripped the supposed 'Powers That Be' a verbal new one by calling them worse than the evils they fought, and while Xander agreed with him on one level, he also knew better on another – in the grand scheme of things, what were a few lives? If these 'people' were any kind of students of history, he knew that they would know that sacrificing a few lives to get a mission done was one thing, but what he really hoped they knew was the fact that those lives meant something to other people and having them thrown away like that tended to piss off loved ones.

That's not to say that he wasn't angry – he still wanted to see what color those bastards bled, but now… now he had a few things to think about before he found out of high beings tasted like chicken.

After a few seconds passed from Angel's last utterance, Xander found himself falling to the ground, his anger now a secondary issue as one of the figures spoke, "It is not your place to criticize us, lower being, nor should you question our orders as you are our Champion."

Angel snorted, "Then I want nothing to do with any of you. YOU chose me, I didn't chose you, and you wanted my… uncontrolled self to mentally torture her for months before she finally did the right thing on a lie from one of her best friends. I don't see myself working with any of you ever again."

The figures nodded again, "You are correct, you will not be. We must now go to our secondary plans, another vampire who can regain his soul…"

Xander snorted and stood, shaking his head, "I wonder what your bosses would say to you if they saw the shit you're pulling here? Angel, you were Catholic, right? Start praying, maybe God'll hear you."

Angel snorted, "Considering all the things I did before I was a vampire, I'm more likely to get beaten than helped, Xander. Still," he conceded as he crossed himself and began to mutter prayers in Latin.

Most of the figures on the bench snorted, "Not even the Almighty could save your damned soul, lower being, only WE can, so pray to Her all you like."

Xander arched an eyebrow, "Oh, so you say that you can do something that God can't? Wouldn't that mean that… She? Isn't God?" He saw the figures jerk a bit and grinned, "Oh, I see… while the cat's away the mice will play, I get it. God doesn't KNOW… you're… doing… this."

Even as Xander finished, the 'room' faded out and it was like he was going to sleep – apparently, something was happening. Something big.

(Library)

"Where is he?"

Giles sighed, "Just as I said five minutes ago, I don't know, Buffy."

"Giles… I can't lose him too. It's taken Xander and I MONTHS to finally get over how I was acting, and now he's gone." Buffy sat down and rocked a little, looking at the scattered dust that had been Angel… Angelus, "And now, Angel is gone, too, and the pair of them are linked. Am I cursed?"

"No, just a touch melodramatic, that's all, Buffy," Jenny said from her place next to Willow as another scrying spell burned out.

Buffy glared at Jenny, "No I'm not! I just don't have a whole lot of friends that I can just LOSE one right now." It had taken her a month to get over the fact that Xander was Xander now, a machine who was wearing her Xander-shaped friend's face and spoke with his voice, and one who occasionally made jokes like Xander, and it had taken her that long to get the oft-absent Kendra Hawthorne, her sister Slayer, to keep from trying to kill Xander every time she saw him (Kendra now just settled for ignoring him outright). By no means was it like before Halloween, when he had been her flesh-and-blood Xander-shaped-friend, especially with the very odd 'relationship' between him, Aura and Jenny, but she couldn't cast stones as she'd had a relationship with a vampire, but they were getting closer to where it had been.

The same could not be said between him and Willow – Xander and Willow had once been like a peanut butter and banana sandwich, one did not exist without the other (and why did everyone look at her oddly when she said that? It was GOOD!), but now that was not the case. Willow sniped at Xander, she sniped at Aura, and the only person who seemed to want to be around Willow was the new guy, Oz – Buffy had tried to ask her about it, but Willow had cut her off every time, saying that it was a non-issue. Buffy wasn't sure if Willow's problem was that Xander wasn't human anymore, of if it was the fact that he was smarter than all of them put together, but whatever it was, it needed to stop, soon.

Jenny just rolled her eyes a little, "Buffy, this is Xander, the one man on the planet I am not related to and trust – do you honestly think he isn't trying to get back here?"

Buffy saw Giles wince out of the corner of her eye, but she went on, "But if we don't know how he left, how do we know he can get back?"

Jenny just shrugged, "I have faith in him, Buffy."

Anything else that was to be said was cut off as the phone rang, which Giles picked up, "Rupert Giles… Sam? Sam, calm down – what is wrong?" Buffy became anxious as she saw the blood start to drain out of Giles' face and as he muttered, "Good Lord…"

(Elsewhere)

Xander blinked and, once again, sat up from his place on the ground – gone was the sterile white kangaroo court and in it's place… a deli? He could smell the roasted peppers, the roast beef, and sausages… somewhere in the place was a good, beef sausage in the air, the kind Willow's grandma used to make.

Idly, his stomach grumbled as he looked around, "Where-"

"Somehow I doubt you'd like the answer to that, young man." He looked over and saw an older man sitting at a table, a cup of coffee and a bagel in front of him, "Sit, sit, we have so few guests here."

Xander nodded and sat down across from the man, a cup of coffee and a cream cheese Danish appearing in front of him as if by magic, "How-"

"Another question you don't want answered," the elderly man assured him. He took a sip of his coffee and looked up at him, "Tell me, why did The Powers want you destroyed? It is not many who can get their robes in a knot."

Xander picked up his cup of coffee and frowned, "I destroyed a vampire they had plans for."

The older man scoffed, his face looking rather familiar, "Drama queens, the lot of them." He reached into his jacket and removed a cigar and a this pair of black-rimmed glasses, the latter he put on over his eyes and the former he lit up and took a few puffs on, "So, tell me, why did you tell the vampire to pray?"

Xander frowned for a moment and then shrugged, "Well, actually, I was just grasping at straws from what I remember about his past."

The man chuckled a bit and took a few more puffs off of his cigar, "Smart thinking, I like that in a young man. And, at that range, He would have heard you if you would have whispered."

Xander frowned again, "'He'? I thought the Pricks said 'She'?"

"They did, but God is God, man or woman, and appears to you as you'd think God would." He put his cigar down and picked up the bagel, which had what appeared to be cream cheese and jam on it, "So, what do you think God would look like?"

Xander shrugged, "Honestly, I don't know. Haven't thought about in a long time."

The man chewed thoughtfully, "You don't believe, Alexander?"

Xander shook his head a little, "I don't know. I mean, sure, I believe in demons, hell, even believe IN Hell, but I'm not sure if I believe in God."

The old man nodded a little, "That's fair, given what it is that you do and were on Earth."

Xander looked up, "You-"

"Know?" The old man chuckle, a dry, raspy sound, "Just think of me as an old busy body, kid, someone who has been around the block so many times that even the ant hills fall within my treads." He drank a little more coffee and ate some more of his bagel as Xander did the same, but then another man walked into the deli, one wearing a white toga… and wings? "Michael."

The winged man nodded, "It has been done, Sir."

The old man nodded and stood, putting on a hat and grabbing his cane, "It's been good speaking with you, Alexander. Keep up the good work." With that, the old man tottered out of the deli-like place and was followed by the winged man, 'Michael'.

Xander just sat there, dumbly, for several minutes before he was finally able to ask himself, "How did he know my name?"

Xander didn't get an answer, instead the deli faded away and he felt sleepy again.

(Another part of Elsewhere)

Angel looked around, confused at the clouds, the people, and the guy with the big book… in front of some really nice gates… his eyes widened, "My God…"

"No, I'm Peter, Saint Peter to you, Liam," the man with the book said with a slight smirk on his face. "Don't worry, I get that a lot, though."

Angel shook his head, "What am I doing here?"

Saint Peter smirked a little, "Oh, you're finally getting what's coming to you, Liam. Sure, you're a few centuries late, but don't worry, it happens more often than you think."

Angel just shook his head at how surreal this all was as Peter started looking through his book.

(Library)

Jenny looked up as a sparkle of light began to enter the room and saw an old man standing next to a body that looked like, "Xander?"

The old man, wearing thick black-rimmed glasses, holding a cane and smoking a cigar took a moment to look her up and down before he shook his head, "No, I'm not Xander. He's Xander, I'm… someone else." The old man then reached down with his cane and smacked Xander on the forehead with the end of it, "Wake up, kid, you have people who want to talk to you."

Xander hissed and sat up, "Ow!"

Jenny looked at the old man and saw that he was gone, but that didn't matter as Buffy barreled into Xander's side, quickly followed by Willow, and then Jenny herself as the ever-growing pile rolled across the floor.

After a few moments, and a few feel-ups that Jenny received that she was sure were meant for Xander, the group disengaged and Xander groaned, "Ow."

Buffy snorted, "Stop trying to milk sympathy, Xander, we know you can't feel pain."

Xander looked over at her, "Tell that to whoever it was who put their knee into my inner left thigh, Buff. It hurts." Xander then stopped and blinked, a smile starting to spread across his face, "It. Hurts!"

Jenny edged closer, away from Willow, who was looking at her a blushing a little, "Xander… are you telling us that you FEEL pain?"

Xander nodded, his grin spreading even more, "Yeah, I do. How, I don't care, but I do." Xander got to his feet and grabbed her into a hug, quickly starting to skip around into a crazed little dance while almost giggling. Jenny found herself caught up in the giggling soon and the pair of them were prancing about, in circles giggling like crazed children.

After a moment, though, the prancing stopped and Xander looked around, "Hang on, where's Giles? And why are you blushing, Willow?"

"Rupert is in his office, taking a call from Sam Zabutto," Jenny said, getting herself under control, "and Willow… well, she's embarrassed because she groped me instead of you."

Xander arched an eyebrow and looked at the almost molten Willow, "Why Willow, how forward of you. If you wanted to do that, I'm sure you could have just asked Jenny to grope her."

"Xander!"

Jenny found herself blushing even as Xander grinned at Willow, "Yes?"

Willow flung herself at Xander, driving him back several steps as she crushed his chest into a powder, crying more than a little. Jenny had to admit that, even though Willow had been a true pain as of the past few months, she was starting to redeem herself by acting in what Buffy had described as a 'Willow-like fashion'.

Xander gagged a little, "Wills, air, needed, live…"

Willow released Xander as if he had suddenly grown hot, "Xander… your heart's beating. How? You're human-y, not, you know, Terminator-y."

Xander rubbed his ribs and coughed a few times, "Yeah, I know I am. How, though, I'm not sure. Maybe that old guy from the deli had something to do with it?" Xander shook his head a little and coughed one last time, "He knew my name without me asking, and a guy in a toga and wings called him 'Sir'…"

Buffy stepped in, shaking her head, "Hold on, hold on, Xander. What deli? What guy with wings and a toga? And if you were at a deli, where's the goodies that you SHOULD have brought back to share with your bestest Slayer friend?"

Xander just snorted, "You're only that way when there is food involved, Buffy. Guy with the wings and sheet was named 'Michael'…" Xander shook his head, "I think, anyway. It's all getting kinda fuzzy now…"

Giles' office opened up and said Watcher walked out, "I'm afraid I have some… Xander?"

Xander nodded, "Giles. I'm human again. Explain?"

Giles shook his head a little, "Um… no, I'm afraid I cannot right now."

Buffy broke in, again, "Giles, you said you were afraid you had… something of the bad?"

Giles looked at her oddly for a moment, "What? Oh, yes, quite right. I have some terrible news. Kendra is dead."

Jenny frowned, "Didn't she just get into town earlier today?"

Giles nodded, "Yes, she did, Jenny… Sam found her in the bus station, her throat ripped out and what appeared to be a wheelchair and a poppet of some kind next to her."

Willow frowned, "Poppet?"

"A little doll, Wills," Xander said absently. "Giles, doesn't Angelus' kid, Dru, carry around one of those?"

Giles nodded, "Yes, Xander, she does, and that's 'childe', not 'kid'. What is most disturbing is that the dust he found was checked by a spell and it showed that Drusilla had been destroyed in this act."

Xander looked at Buffy, "A wheelchair? When did that happen?"

Buffy nodded, "That happened when Angel was going to be used to re-empower Dru. Giles… what's going on? Everything around here is getting weird, even for us."

Giles shook his head, "I'm not entirely sure, Buffy, God knows I wish I knew…"

"Careful what you wish for, Ripper." Xander spun and saw the old man with the cigar, cane and glasses, a smirk on his old lips, "And even if I could tell you, where'd be the fun in that?" He looked at Xander and grinned, "Hey, kid. Feeling better? Human, even?"

Xander blinked a few times, "Um, yeah, thanks for asking. Who are you?"

The old man chuckled, "Oh, I think you know, kid. Anyway, just checking up on you. Sorry about the head, and tell that girl, Aura, to take it easy on you." With that, the guy vanished away from the Library with a sparkle of lights.

Xander shook his head, "That's weird. I think he was trying to tell us something."

Jenny walked her, a knife in her hand, "I think he was, Xander." She grabbed his hand and cut his finger deep enough that blood welled up. Even as Willow and Buffy shouted, Jenny muttered, "'… if you prick me, do I not bleed?'"

"The Bard," Xander said absently as he looked at the blood. The Terminator couldn't bleed. Humans could. What the hell was going… no, not hell, he realized as he felt the color fade from his face, "Um, guys? I think I know who that was."

AN: Confusing enough? Extra brownie points if you figured out who was playing Him. Reviews, please.