Chapter 2

While trick or treating with the children, a wave of chaos magic hit Sunnydale and everyone who bought something from that cursed shop was turned into whatever person or thing his costume represented. Buffy became a French noble woman, Willow a ghost, Amy an awesome looking young reporter and I? I think you can guess that. I turned into Harry Dresden, at least partially. I was still there as Harry appeared and we shared my mind for the evening and I just have to say that I like Harry's humor.

Shortly after Harry arrived we stumbled over the body of my friend Willow. Man, that was quite a shock for me, finding Willow like that, and that wasn't the last shock of that evening. Just a few moments after we found her Willow suddenly stood before me in a ghost like form. I nearly jumped out of my body at that point. After we talked a moment I picked up her body and we went to Buffy's house, which was the closest. There we stored Willow's body and Harry pointed out, after going through my memories of the last few days that only the owner of the costume shop could be the one at fault for all that chaos.

I sent Willow to the library to inform Giles and to keep an eye out for Buffy. Seconds before I left Buffy's house I heard a sound coming out of the kitchen. I quickly went into it and saw a dark silhouette near the table. Before I could do anything myself, Harry took control, raised the staff and shouted "Fuego." A stream of fire was hurled into the direction of the intruder and before he could dodge, he was hit by it right in the middle. The intruder stood going up in flames for a second or two and before I could do anything, he exploded into a cloud of dust.

"Damn Harry, what was that?" I asked Harry's presence in my mind.

"It was a vampire and we killed it," Harry answered.

"If that was Angel, I better not tell anyone about that part of the evening," was my comment.

After a quick check of Willow's body we ran to the shop. At that time of day the door was naturally locked, but Harry didn't even let me stop before he shouted, "Forzare." An unseen force blew the door off of its hinges and with a loud crash it landed somewhere in the shop. We stormed through the door and not seeing anyone at the front, we quickly ran to the backroom. There in front of a statue of the roman god Janus (yeah I know, I never heard of him, but Harry supplied that information) kneeled the owner of the shop, who I met yesterday and who had introduced himself as Ethan.

With a quite forceful hit I hit his back with my staff and after he sagged to the ground, he moaned out loud in pain, while I put the staff under his nose. In quite a civilized tone (cough, cough) I asked, "Tell me how to break your spell, warlock, or the next thing I hit is your nose."

In a painful tone he coughed out to destroy the statue.

As a thank you I didn't break his nose, I just mumbled, "Dormio, dorme," and then the warlock fell asleep. After that I turned to the statue and like a professional baseball player I hit the statue with my staff. The problem was that my staff rebounded. Nothing happened, the statute was still whole.

"Let me try something," Harry said and I just nodded.

Harry raised the staff, pointed it at the statue and yelled, "Arctis."

The statue looked like it was covered in ice. This time Harry hit it with the staff and the statue exploded into a thousand tiny little pieces and suddenly I was hit by a wave of magic that felt like I'd been hit by a freight train. Without any chance to resist I fell to the ground, unconscious.

This ended the evening for me.

Later I was told by Giles, that he arrived at the shop shortly after a magical shockwave had swept through Sunnydale. Willow told him about what happened to all the people who had changed into their costumes and that not everyone had changed. Thanks to Cordellia, whom Willow met on her way to the library, they deducted that only people who bought their costumes at 'Ethan's' had changed into someone or something. After hearing the name Ethan, Giles hurried to the shop where he found me and the still sleeping Ethan.

Luckily for Willow, Buffy and most of the others the chaos spell had no lasting consequences, except that Buffy can now speak French like she was born there.

Xander took a sip of his beer and looked at the young person at his table and nodded, "You're right, I said most. For some people the night had consequence. A friend of us, Amy Madison, dressed as a reporter, as I told you before. Sadly she dressed as Susan Rodriguez."

Xander listened to what the listener at his table said and nodded, "Yes, the Susan out of The Dresden Files which was later turned into a Red Court Vampire. She wasn't the only one who had something left over from that night, besides us there were a few others, but that's another story. And as you have guessed, I stayed a Wizard. I woke up three days after Halloween with a headache as big as Mount Fiches and with all the knowledge, skills and power of one Harry Dresden."

After Xander kissed Faith again he continued, "That was the short version of how I started on my path as a Wizard. After that I helped Buffy a lot. We saved the world a few times, met the Slayer who was called after Buffy died at the hand of the Master. Believe me that was quite a surprise, somehow the Council of Watchers must have forgotten to tell us about that little fact. Sadly Kendra was killed by a crazy vampire bitch called Drusilla a bit later because of a stupidity on Buffy's part and that's how Faith came to be called as the next Slayer."

Hiding a yawn Xander continued, "So my young friend, that's enough for today. If we're lucky, we'll meet again here on Saturday and I'll tell some more then."

Faith and Xander stood up, paid for the three of them and then left the bar.