The next morning, the expanded Scooby gang met in the library, early enough. The 'temporally-impaired' showed up around seven in the morning, while the others at a more sedate ten o'clock. Xander had asked Angel to return to the library with the earlier group to help with sparring and possible leads in research, Xander and Doyle staying a little longer to cover the windows with tarps and such to prevent the souled vampire from 'crispy critter' status. The vampire had also been told to suck down a bunch o' blood since they wanted the real capability of a master, not just his usual performance. Begrudgingly, he'd agreed.
Xander, Dawn, Doyle and now Willow had started slow and easy, increasing in speed and strength, introducing new moves and variations as they sparred. Giles and Angel watched with increasing awe as the normal humans began to sometimes reach vampire and slayer levels of speed. Willow's Bene Gesserit bindu and other trainings gave her a greater flexibility in some of her movements, only stamina eventually causing her to bow out, Doyle a while later even with a wooden sword. The two toweled off and accepted juice and tea as they watched and commented the performances of Dawn and Xander, moving into juiced up Slayer and Hyena levels, Dawn having a speed advantage but Xander apparently holding an amazing skill advantage.
When Dawn and Xander broke apart, Doyle tapped Angel, holding a quarterstaff, "You're on Dawn's side." Angel nodded and got up, moving in to match Xander as the two combatants had switched to staves. Xander, noticing Angel, powered up more, his eyes flashing slightly as he tapped his inner power further. As Angel moved in, Xander used a chair to vault up, over and around a surprised Dawn, the young man using his mass to snap his staff into two equal parts as he suddenly had to confront both. Buffy walked in the door with Wesley and Linda, having given them a daylight tour before heading to the library again. They gaped at Xander using skill and position to so-far hold off or redirect the attacks of his opponents, launching kick and stab attacks and feints to hold them off, taking the occasional glancing blow. Buffy frowned for a moment, then smiled, picking up a staff of her own and headed in to join the fun.
Xander grinned as the Slayer headed in, and powered up to his fullest, knowing he wouldn't last too much longer as Willow and Doyle headed in also. Xander made sure Buffy saw he Hyena flash, and as Doyle moved to stand with Xander, Willow and Buffy and moved to ally with Dawn and Angel.
At full power, Xander suddenly threw a half staff 'slowly' at Angel's chest, then the other at Dawn's face as he front-cart-wheeled follow-up kicks against their chests, his whole force pushing the defending duo back onto their rears as he grabbed Angel's quarterstaff, tapped him directly on the test yelling 'dust' before continuing into a surprised Willow. This left a temporarily out of range Dawn as being intercepted by a defending Doyle as Buffy was behind Willow and thus out of the fight for a moment. Willow's new skills allowed her to bend away and be missed by Xander's kicks and first lashing outs, but a very light quick tap of the rubber-ended staff and the call of 'hit' left her out of the match. Dawn still recovering her rhythm against the now-backpedaling Doyle, was taken by surprise when Xander, who faced a Buffy stepping back to avoid Willow-squashage, suddenly yelled 'duck.'
Doyle dropped fully to the ground and lashed out blindly in Dawn's direction as Xander turned and end-lunged directly into Dawn, who, too busy countering Doyle, took a tap in the left chest, but not before barely glancing the side of Doyle's head enough to call him out as well. Buffy, taking a shot at what she thought was an exposed Xander, found that he was able to reverse thrust his captured staff as they both scored hard 'killing' chest shots, falling back.
"Draw and Time!" Giles shouted out, ending the combat, before the participants could consider continuing. As the group exhaled, laughed and chided each other's shots, the Watcher marveled aloud at their performance, "Amazing. The last segment was like a male slayer and capable hunter fighting four masters or slayers, if no minions were around only the hunter would walk away."
"Nice moves, Xander," Angel complimented, "That throwing was risky but given two more big guns were jumping in fresh, the only thing you could do."
"Yeah, guys," Buffy enthused, the last Xander move surprisingly wowing rather than ticking her off, "Where did you pick that up; it couldn't all be from the Dune guys."
"Well, Willow's was," Xander explained, "But Dawn once went as a Slayer, Doyle as an Immortal and a couple others, and I went as a few guys."
"Y-yes, uh, Xander, could you be more specific," Giles asked, "I know you covered some of the more colorful figures, and some of the knowledge of the Resets, but these abilities are amazing."
"Well, Ripper knew a few spells that you forgot," Xander began with a small smile, "And the Hyena wasn't entirely expelled, but now is merged into me like every person I dress as, including Methos, Kronos, Alexander the Great, Spartacus, Bruce Lee and modern soldiers, so what you see is the end result. I still need to…distill it all into a single body of capability, but the pieces are all there."
"Amazing," Giles repeated.
Kendra and Faith had slinked out of Faith's band attic around ten, avoiding the custodian as well as the Scooby Gang. They walked back toward a place called the Espresso Pump that Tara had told them about. Faith, happy and appreciative of morning coffee and able to afford it for now, happily coaxed Kendra out into the day time world.
"Hey Tara!" Faith greeted, waving to the girl sitting inside but next to the window, "Is this a counter or wait place?"
"B-both," the girl replied, smiling back about a little nervous, "Y-your choice." Faith looked around, shouting to the lone person behind the counter, who looked up, "Another for Tara, pot of breakfast tea with the fixins on the side, and I'll have two triple mochas with extra shots and the works. Oh, and three of whatever roll sandwich things you might have on special." She sat down and smiled at her gaping, "You girls want anything?" before giving them the 'Faith is playing with you look.'
The girls spent the better part of an hour talking about what little they knew about the loop, and about things in general, Faith insisting that the 'girl team' try to look at things, making it up out of thin air, before approaching the main bunch.
"W-why?" Tara asked, Kendra turning to Faith for a reply.
"If we figure out all sorts of things first, then when we do go to them we might actually have ideas they haven't thought up," the Bostonian said, "And if anybody is actually trying to end the world, they're probably watching them and not us, so we might pick up on them first and get the drop on 'em."
"Dat is good tinkin' Faith," Kendra approved, "But let's not wait too long. Now, where should we start?"
"Hmm, we're dealing with costume changes and just a few people, and from the sounds of it, that Xander guy seems to be in the middle of it, but not necessarily causing it," Faith replied, "And Tara's snazzy dresser friend said his group was a bunch of good guys in the future…"
"A-and both of you said the P-powers sent you here, and that it was like g-groundhog day," Tara added, "So maybe we h-have to get X-Xander to accept himself and h-his l-life."
"Okay, so we have costume thing, and Xander thing," Faith considered, "So how about we go after the costume guy and give him the once over as soon as he closes shop?"
"Y-you mean j-just ask him what's g-going on?" Tara asked.
"Too simple?" Faith asked, looking unsure all of a sudden.
"N-no, it's j-just…m-more peaceful than I-I expected," Tara replied, blushing.
"It could still get hot," Faith replied, "But we have Kendra here as the muscle if we need it, and you could always torch his shop if we have to run away screaming." Kendra and Tara both smiled in agreement.
"I-I will call in sick, a-and pick you up in my car where you said you started," Tara said, "It should only take twenty minutes to reach both of you."
"Cool," Faith replied, as the beverages and food showed up, "I haven't really gotten to go to these fancy girly places before…" she began, but Tara put a hand on her shoulder.
"I-it's o-kay," Tara said with an almost exaggerated look of concern on her face, "I r-ran away a couple of m-months ago and am going to s-start c-college in January, so I know how you feel. You sh-ould enjoy your self if you can."
"So, uh, I've never been to a beach before," Faith responded, slightly tearing up at having a couple of actual friends, "Can we go?" Her friends nodded, and not having anything to do before the next loop, agreed to do that next.
Whistler reached the Post Office building in Los Angeles around eight-thirty after much inconvenience, only to find himself unable to move within a hundred yards of the place. Sitting on the curb, he decided that as he couldn't even think about doing anything until the next go-around, he might as well have some fun. Looking at the electronic route display on the bus stopping in front of him, he decided to board it, 'I never did get a chance to ride the Matterhorn the last time I got a break…back in seventy…' And on that note, the balance demon rode the express bus to Disneyland…