X-tra! X-tra! Read all about IT!
After a moment of silence, Buffy asked, "How many have seen the Dungeon Master there do his little spiel and only show up when you finally get to the answer to his riddle?"
Everyone except Giles, Jenny, Mark Kendall, and Debbie all raised their hands in agreement.
"Well, he did help us, I mean the X-men, figure out how to end the spell," Willow pointed out.
"Don't remind me," Buffy grunted. But it was too late.
Memory Flash:
Cyclops was leading his . . . (grrrr!) . . . make that /her/ team through the chaotic streets. They had just met up, after being scattered nearly all over the strange town they had found themselves in. And if that wasn't confusing enough, they each seemed to not be . . . "themselves", but rather were possessing the bodies of very /young/ teenagers. Almost younger, he . . . (grrrr!) . . . /she/ thought, than when he and the other first X-Men had started under Professor Xavier.
The only good news out of this whole situation, beyond their communicators, all of their powers still worked. Yet given the fact that they were possessing the bodies of others, Cyclops didn't find this fact all that comforting.
Phoenix, no doubt sensing his train of thought, sidled up to . . . /her/ and began to speak quietly through the private connection they had shared for so many years. Beyond the fact that they'd been in love since before they'd even graduated High School, not even the Professor could find an easy explanation for how Scott seemed to have a few psychic powers of his own. At least where Jean Grey was concerned.
/You look troubled,/ she observed.
/Is there any reason I /shouldn't/ be?/ he snapped back, in his mind at least his voice truly his own.
Jean had no immediate reply to that, so Cyclops just grunted and began walking a bit faster. After about fifteen more steps, they were forced to stop when a blinding flash of light suddenly stopped the X-Men in their tracks, crying out in pain. Even Cyclops had to look away, despite already wearing protective eye-wear.
When they could see again, an . . . odd little old man was standing before them. He was dressed in red and yellow robes, was bald save for long snow white hair coming from the sides and back of his head. His face was more like that of a gnome than anything remotely human. Overall though, save for his flashy entrance, he seemed perfectly harmless.
"What the . . . !" Cyclops screamed and then turned to give the old man a full optic blast, but Phoenix reached out to stop him just in time.
"Hello strangers," the old man said with a pleasant lilt. "I bring you tidings from the Realm . . . and this realm, called Earth."
"News flash pops!" Bobby sarcastically retorted, "We already knew we're on Earth. We're /from/ Earth!"
"Yes, but not this Earth," the man easily replied with a smile.
"Who are you? What do you want? Do you know what's going on here?" Cyclops demanded.
"I am called the Dungeon Master," the old man easily answered, "I want very little for myself, but at this moment I will say that I want your help in solving this . . . mess, shall we call it? And I know a great many things, the current happenings included."
The X-Men all stared at the strange little old man before glancing at one another. Finally Rogue just shrugged and asked, "So do you know how we can get back home or at least stop possessin' these kids here?"
"Things are a great deal more complicated than you have uncovered so far," Dungeon Master answered. "You are not the only that have been taken from their homes this night, and placed within these children." Dungeon Master then waved his hand over his own face, which was suddenly that of a young boy, not much taller than the Dungeon Master himself, wearing a rather poor Halloween costume that seemed to match with the Dungeon Master, though the wig/cap was very poorly put on and splotches of dark youthful hair could be seen poking out here and there.
"Once you find the one who watches and guides the children, it will only be a matter of choosing to follow your instincts, or your darker impulses. Beware the two-faced Roman, and as always, thinking before choosing is wisest. I leave you now." The Dungeon Master then reverted back to the way he'd been at first, and then disappeared in the same blinding flash of light.
"What the hell was that about?" Rogue drawled.
"A clue?" Phoenix suggested. "A riddle, about how to solve this . . . mess he called it?"
"Well what the hell does it mean?" Cyclops snapped, her temper starting to get the better of her.
"Wait . . ." Phoenix muttered, an idea suddenly occurring to her.
"What?" the other X-Men all blurted.
"When he . . . he changed his face, revealing the boy he was possessing . . . I think . . . I think I might be able to reach the girl whose body this is. I need to meditate, focus inward. Uh, the middle of a street isn't exactly the best place to do this in either," Phoenix pointed out.
Cyclops looked around, finally spotted what appeared to be a house that had no one in it for the moment. "There. We'll hide in there for the moment."
Quickly they trotted up to the steps, however Cyclops came up short when a wave of deja vu overswept her. Almost on instinct, her hand reached down into the pocket of her costume and pulled out a key.
"Cyke, you OK?" Iceman asked.
Cyclops merely held up the key, more than a little shocked at not only its presence, but how she'd know it'd been there. Then she took a closer look at the house, and especially the door in front of them. '/No way. There's just . . . no way./' he thought.
Nevertheless, Cyclops stepped forward, and put the key into the lock, it fit, and unlocked the door. Now the others were all staring in shock.
"Follow your instincts, or your darker impulses," the Leader of the X-Men quoted, suddenly starting to view things a bit differently.
"Freaky," Iceman agreed.
"C'mon, let's get inside," Phoenix urged.
Quickly, they crowded inside. The home wasn't the mansion, but it was quaint, and big enough for a small family. There were stairs right in front of them going up to the second level, and then a living room on the left of the foyer and a dining room on the right.
"Bobby, Rogue, check upstairs," Cyclops ordered. "Jean, think you can meditate in the living room OK?"
"Yeah, just . . . don't disturb me for a while, OK?" the redhead requested. The Team Leader of the X-Men simply nodded, going into the dining room to check out the rest of the lower level of the house.
Out of the corner of her eye, just as she'd been about to go into the kitchen, Cyclops caught sight of some pictures on a table. Picking one up, she saw three smiling teenagers in a group hug, posing for the camera. One of them was the same redhead Jean had possessed, while the boy in the picture looked very similar to the body Bobby was occupying. That left the smiling blonde girl in the middle, who did not look like the body Rogue was in.
Gulping, Cyclops slowly looked up and caught a reflection from a mirror that just happened to be hanging nearby. Only a quick glance confirmed it, but the mutant couldn't help going up to the mirror and comparing the face there with the one from the picture in her hand. Taking a deep breath, Cyclops finally put the picture back where he got it and quickly finished checking the rest of the downstairs, locking doors and windows if there were any open.
Once a complete circuit was done, Cyclops met back up with Iceman and Rogue in the foyer.
"Not exactly the most defensible position ever, but we've been in worse," Cyclops commented on the house.
"Yeah, and at least we haven't managed to piss anybody off enough to come chasing after us," Iceman joked.
"Yet," Rogue finished the thought.
"Keep an eye out," Cyclops ordered, then held up a finger in Iceman's face, "No jokes. Bobby, you watch the back, beep us over the communicators if you see anything trying to get in. Rogue, you cover the upstairs, find one of the rooms with a window to the front yard. I'll stay and watch the front and make sure nothing disturbs Jean."
"Roger boss," Iceman grinned then headed towards the back. Rogue just nodded and quietly floated back up the stairs.
Cyclops just sighed and turned around to glance at Jean before turning full attention to the outside.
Phoenix was meditating, as she'd done for years ever since her telepathic abilities had manifested. The only difference was that she wasn't centering herself this time, she was searching her mind, searching inside herself to find someone else. The person she was possessing.
Surprisingly, which it shouldn't have been, it didn't take very much searching before she came across the consciousness of Willow Rosenberg. The difficulty came in finding a way to communicate with Willow, as the girl was not a powerful psychic herself . . . on the other hand, Jean thought after another moment's looking at the girl, the problem was more that Willow didn't know /how/ to use her psychic powers, let alone was even aware of them.
It took a few more minutes of mental struggle, but finally Jean was able to create a bridge between herself and Willow and thereby allowed Willow access to Jean's own knowledge and experience on how to control and use telepathic powers.
Finally, Jean heard a tentative pulse of thought, just what she'd been waiting for. Willow had had to make the first step, but Jean could quickly build from that.
H-h-hello? Uh, wh-wh-what . . . what is g-going on?
Hello Willow Jean replied as she pulled both herself and Willow into the Astral Plane so that they might talk 'face-to-face'.
The infinite black sky and neon pink ground formed around them before ultimately the bodies of the two telepaths formed there in the exact middle. Jean appeared as she always did, according to how her mind wished to represent herself, her in her X-Men uniform, red hair waving like a flame, and the sign of the phoenix glowing over one eye.
And as always, the Astral Plane was very accommodating to the way that a person viewed themselves, and represented them accordingly. Jean laughed slightly when Willow's form appeared. Red hair like her own, only where Jean's moved like a living flame, Willow's lay flat and hung almost like a . . . Jean laughed again . . . like a weeping willow tree. Her skin was pale and she seemed to be much shorter than Jean knew her body actually was. What made her laugh initially though was the fact that Willow had appeared in a poor copy, or rather a costume version of her own X-Men uniform.
"What just happened?" Willow blurted, taking in the surrounding, and then noticing Jean and locking onto her.
"Who-who . . . who are you?" the timid redhead stuttered.
"My name is Jean Grey. Don't worry Willow, I won't hurt you. I brought you here so we could talk."
The thoughts flowed freely between them, and Jean smiled understandingly as it seemed Willow wasn't getting past the fact that she was talking to a 'fictional' character.
"Yes, I really am Jean Grey, and the real Jean Grey. I'm not sure of how much you're aware of what's been going on in the real world, but apparently when you and your friends dressed up as us, the X-Men for Halloween, something happened that caused us to suddenly possess your bodies. I don't suppose you might have some ideas about how this could have happened, do you?"
Willow was quiet for several minutes (although on the Astral Plane things like that are entirely a matter of perspective), trying to absorb what Jean was telling her and thinking things through. Finally, tentatively, the younger redhead answered, "It . . . was probably a . . . spell of some kind."
"Magic," Jean agreed, seeing how Willow had come to that answer. She'd seen magic do some pretty amazing things in her life, pulling the minds of people from other dimensions to possess others wasn't outside the realm of possibility. Although the power requirements . . . This mage must be more powerful than Dr. Strange!
"We're on a Hellmouth," Willow interrupted.
"What?" Jean shook her head to listen to the young girl.
"Sorry, I . . . couldn't help hearing your thoughts. We're on a Hellmouth. It's a mystical convergence. Strange stuff is always happening. This is just par for the course really when you think about it," Willow answered.
"A mystical convergence?" Jean repeated, not really all that familiar with the supernatural. Psychic matters were more her forte.
"It's complicated, I know," Willow admitted. "And I'm not that good at explaining it, but Giles . . ." She stopped, her expression suddenly lighting up with excitement and hope. "GILES!" she shouted, nearly deafening Jean when she did. "Giles, he he he's Buffy's Watcher, he's a supernatural expert and he always knows the answer to stuff that's happening and he's got all these books, and he said Halloween was going to be quiet, but that was for demons, not for mages that want to play pranks and stuff, so he should still be in the Library, cause I asked him when we were at the school earlier and he said that he would be doing some stuff in the Library tonight because—"
"WILLOW!" Jean shouted to stop the flow of words that seemed almost endless.
"Sorry, I tend to babble, but we have to find Giles, and hope that he can fix this or at least figure out how we can fix this and . . ." she trailed off when Jean looked to shout again.
"First of all, who is this Giles?" Jean asked calmly.
"He's Buffy's Watcher, a Watcher is like . . . like . . . well, like a trainer for the Slayer. He trains her, helps her research demons and tells her how to kill them."
The 'Watcher' term struck a chord with the older mutant, but everything else made little sense to her. "Buffy? Slayer? And . . . what exactly is a Watcher?" she asked.
"Oh, not a Watcher like Oatu," Willow hastily corrected. "Think of it more like an organization. The Watcher's Council, yeah! And the Slayer is Buffy and . . . uh, well, Buffy is . . . uh, she kind of dressed up as Cyclops . . ." she trailed off for a minute.
Jean just blinked, a little overwhelmed at the revelation that the girl her husband was possessing was named 'Buffy' of all things, and she was actually something called a 'Slayer', whatever that is.
"A Slayer is a mystically empowered warrior, Chosen to fight and kill demons and vampires and the like. She's given super strength, and she can use any weapon like almost the second she picks it up," Willow explained in terms the mutant could understand.
"All right. I've heard stranger, and compared to Reed, Sue and their family you're practically the epitome of normal. Did you see the memory of that Dungeon Master creature?" she asked.
"Oh, that was Jonathan. I thought it was kinda cool to . . . But moving on," Willow interrupted herself when she caught sight of Jean's expression, "Actually, and it's kinda weird, but it's kind of like you're personality, or rather just you has been placed over my own consciousness. I can still see and hear, and experience everything you do, it's still my body after all. It's just I can't control anything. This is kinda cool though. And now that you can hear me, I don't mind sharing. Come to think of it, it must be the same for the others. They can see and hear and still think and stuff, they just do anything. But we should definitely get to Giles. Trust me, if he doesn't immediately know how to take care of this, then he has the means to finding out."
"All right," Jean nodded her agreement. "Give me the basic directions, and then once we're under way we should be able to communicate regularly."
"Right," Willow then explained how to get to the High School Library from Buffy's house, which Jean now knew was where they were, and once Jean had the directions, and with a small goodbye to the other redhead, they left the Astral Plane to return to the real world.
Phoenix's eyes snapped open in the Summers living room. Suddenly there was a rush of memories, both her own and Willow's, making this place both familiar and strange, but a safe place nevertheless.
"Scott!" Phoenix cried out, bringing everyone into the living room.
"Jean, what is it?" Cyclops snapped.
The redhead quickly got to her feet, Willow's body adrenalized, though in no part directly the cause of either Willow nor herself. It seemed the petite frame was easily excitable. It made Jean wonder what coffee did to the young woman, to which Willow replied with an empathic pulse of innocent guilt. Phoenix smiled to herself.
"I managed to get in contact with Willow, the girl I'm possessing," Jean answered, "And I think I may, or rather we may have an idea on what to do next. But first," Jean gave the female-Cyclops with an intense look and said carefully, "Buffy, everything is going to be OK. We're going to Giles next. So don't worry about anything. Oh, and Willow says 'Hi, isn't this cool?'"
Cyclops looked at his/her wife like she was crazy for a second, until a moment later she realized what Phoenix meant, and then confusion flared as he asked, "Who names their kid 'Buffy'?"
Iceman snorted in laughter when Rogue elbowed him in the gut, cutting him off. Phoenix answered, "Her real name is Elizabeth and she used to live in LA. And since she happens to have super strength, I wouldn't laugh too hard Bobby. Or is it Xander?"
Iceman froze, figuratively, and asked, confused himself, "Who's zander?"
"Short for Alexander," Phoenix answered, "And the boy that you're possessing has been Willow's best friend since Kindergarten. She's actually the one that gave him the name Xander."
"Don't suppose ya'd happen to know who I got keelhauled into?" Rogue asked.
Phoenix's face was suddenly clouded in concerned confusion as she listened to Willow's reaction. Hesitantly, "Uh, actually, her name is Cordelia Chase, she's the richest girl in town, the snobbiest bitch at their school, and has made fun of Willow ever since before Kindergarten."
Rogue's eyes went wide with rage, knowing all too well the type Jean had just described. If she could beat herself up, she'd probably be doing it now. Somewhere deep down, she felt a very brief surge of indignation, which covered an ever increasing feeling of fear and guilt.
"Now that everybody knows who everybody is, and that we're going to do our best to help things get back to normal . . . well, normal enough considering this town was built on top of a mystical convergence called a Hellmouth, let's . . ."
Jean was suddenly cut off when a crash came from the back, followed by a figure stumbling into the room from the kitchen.
The figure was then almost immediately followed by a much larger one, the larger one quite obviously intent upon causing serious, if not lethal harm to the first figure. For several long moments of action, the X-Men just stood there, staring at the two figures wrestling there on the floor, thankfully keeping it localized enough to keep from completely trashing the house, until finally Cyclops decided that was enough, and with a signal to Phoenix, reached up to her visor to let loose an optic blast that was timed just right to knock the larger figure back into Rogue's waiting arms. Phoenix meanwhile grabbed the other person and telekinetically lifted them off the ground and away from any surfaces they could push themselves off of.
"Uh, care to explain what the heck is going on here?" Cyclops asked in a tone of voice usually reserved for misbehaving students at the Xavier Institute.
"Buffy?" the more average-sized figure blurted.
Raising an eyebrow at being called the name they'd just learned was the name of the girl Cyclops was possessing, the mutant stepped forward and asked, "We know each other?"
"Is this some kind of joke?" the man asked back.
Finally, everyone seemed to realize the larger figure wasn't even human-shaped, and was giving Rogue quite a fight. "LET GO OF ME!" it screamed in a gravelly sort of roar.
"Calm down an I might!" Rogue screamed back.
"I HAVE TO GET BACK TO TY!" it screamed again, but stopped struggling enough for them to really look at it. It stood close to 7 feet tall and had orange skin and was covered from head to toe in strange yellow armor. Spiky red hair came out the back of it's helmet, but just from everything else they could tell it wasn't human.
"What are you?" Iceman bluntly asked.
"Bobby!" Cyclops snapped back.
The creature however didn't seem to take offense, and in fact wasn't surprised at the question, and answered matter-of-factly, "I'm a Digimon. My name is WarGreymon. Ty told me to stop this man from breaking into this house, just scare him a bit. I had already digivolved, but then he attacked me the moment he saw me. I have to get back to Ty!"
"Who's Ty?" Rogue asked, finally letting go of the . . . digimon.
"He's my partner," WarGreymon answered as though it were obvious.
"Rogue, Bobby, go with him, bring this Ty in with you. He sounds like a kid, and probably is judging by what's happening," Cyclops ordered. "Meanwhile," she and Phoenix turned back to the floating man, "it's you're turn. Who are you, for starters? And what do you know about these teenagers, and what's going on?"
"Buffy, Willow!" the man cried, trying to struggle, but Jean kept a tight grip on him. "What the hell is going on here? It's chaos outside, demons and, and other things I never imagined running around outside, on Halloween! And . . ." he stopped and stared in wide-eyed surprise, "and how are you doing this to me, and how did Cordelia hold that thing? I felt how strong it was . . ."
"You seemed pretty strong yourself, you also have an aura of darkness and thoughts of great evil running through your mind," Jean retorted.
W-w-wait, j-j-Jean a telepathic prompting caused the redhead to pause, though her grip on the man never wavered. I know him. Th-that's Angel. He's a friend. He-he-he...
"I'm a vampire," Angel told them before Willow could fully explain, though the souled vampire didn't know that. "I was cursed with my soul a hundred years ago. Now tell me what you've done with Buffy and Willow! Who . . . what are you?"
Jean opened her link to her husband, then shared a look with the visored female and gave her a nod, explaining everything silently. Cyclops nodded back and Angel was slowly, carefully returned to his feet.
"Somehow, that we do not fully understand as of yet, when these children, all of the children of this town probably, dressed up for Halloween, about a couple of hours ago, their costumes became real, and we, the people they dressed as, are now possessing them. We're actually from another dimension . . ." she stopped when Angel held up his hand.
"You're . . . possessing Buffy? And the others?" he clarified. Cyclops tersely nodded.
At that moment the rest of the group came back in, though with a small yellow dinosaur-like creature instead of WarGreymon and a young adolescent, 10 maybe 11-years-old at the most.
"Hey! Where's WarGreymon?" Cyclops demanded, "Was there a problem?"
"Chill out Boss," Rogue drawled, pointing at the small dinosaur creature, "WarGreymon went all glowy and turned into the runt here. Pointed out the kid here as being Ty. We closed up behind us, and I made sure no one . . . dangerous was still around."
"Hey!" the thing that looked like a baby T-Rex exclaimed in a squeaky imitation of WarGreymon's gravelly roar. "I am /not/ a runt! I'm Agumon. I de-digivolved back to my Rookie form!"
That raised some eyebrows, especially from the X-Men. "You can transform yourself?" Jean asked.
Agumon nodded proudly.
"You must be Ty," Cyclops finally acknowledged the young boy.
"Is this the Digital World, or the Real World?" was the first thing he asked.
Everyone shared a nervous look, but it was Cyclops that answered, "The Real World, but not the Real World that you're used to. It'd take a while to explain what we /think/ is happening, and we've got to go somewhere, hopefully to clear this mess up. But the basics is that somehow we've all been transported from our homes into these bodies that are not our own in another dimension, possibly another universe altogether."
"Oh," the boy didn't seem to phased by that. Then he turned to the lizard at his side and said, "Well buddy, here we go again, huh?"
"Look at the bright side Ty," it replied, "It's not /as/ bad as the Digital World, and nobody's screaming monster at me. Yet."
"Trust me, we've seen weirder," Iceman confided in the duo.
"Yeah, funny thing is, so've we," Ty replied with a weak grin.
"All right, you!" Cyclops pointed her finger at Angel, stepping forward into the vampire's personal space. "You said you're a vampire, correct?"
"Uh, yeah?" Angel was uncertain with this strange, possessed Buffy.
"That means enhanced strength, reflexes, and at least a century or so of fighting experience, right?"
"Uh, yeah . . ."
"Good," Cyclops turned back to her team and said over her shoulder, "You help Agumon, or WarGreymon, or whatever else he becomes, protect the boy, and any other innocent kids or people you come across. Don't injure or kill anything out there, no matter how inhuman it may appear, and only attack it if it attacks you first, and then only in self-defense, and don't hurt it, not even if you recognize it as a personal enemy. We've got to get to the High School Library to get to the bottom of all of this."
She stopped and turned to fully face the souled vampire, all the other X-Men directly behind her, "You can handle that, right?"
"Uh, yeah," Angel dumbly nodded his head.
"Looks like we'll be doing all the protecting buddy," Ty shared with his partner, who agreed.
Angel noted this, and nodded with more conviction, confident that whoever it was that was possessing Buffy at the moment was more than capable of protecting her. And if not her, or whoever it was, then certainly all the others she'd gathered around her.
"Do you want us to stay here?" he asked.
Cyclops snorted so loud it was almost comical. "Hell no. Take them some place safe, and get as many innocents as you can along the way. This is a house, a place to live in, hardly defendable in riot conditions. You're a vampire, and that means aversion to sunlight, right?" Angel nodded. "Someplace where no sun, limited entry, and thick walls should do it, provided it's not more dangerous than the streets."
"I've got a place in mind," Angel told them. "We'll go there immediately."
"After we find my friends!" Ty argued.
"The friends you may mean might not have been brought with you into this world Ty," Phoenix tried to explain. "Is there any way that you could communicate with them, or even find out if your friends are here with you?"
"Of course!" Ty suddenly exclaimed and pulled out a small white electronic device. "The Digivice!" He held onto it for several long seconds until it suddenly beeped three times, and then was silent. "Huh, that's weird. It's only detecting one other Digivice. Usually this thing can pick up all of my friends and their Digivices!"
"Find his friend, pick up everybody you can along the way/then/ get them all to a safe place," Cyclops ordered Angel.
The vampire nodded his agreement, and once that was confirmed, the X-Men raced out, following Willow's directions to the High School Library.
End Memory Flash
Buffy shook her head to clear the cobwebs, and made sure to remind herself later to ask Angel about what all happened with that Ty kid and everything after they left. Looking across the Round Table at Iczel, she suddenly realized that Agumon, and any other pets like him might have remained behind, even as their "partners" left to go back to where they came from.
"So where should we meet, since we're going to meet again?" Mark Kendall asked.
"Actually," Willow shared a look with Xander and the others, "we've found an abandoned lot that is almost ideal for training, for those of us with rather destructive powers and abilities. We'll give you the address and if anyone needs a ride or anything, just let us know and we'll figure something out."
"There's one more question," Jake spoke up.
"Uh, go ahead," Willow nodded for the Star Fleet Commander to continue.
"You mentioned something about us," he gestured at him and his crew, "being a godsend for you. Why was that? And why was learning about a dimensional rift and the fact that myths and magic are real, suddenly change our mind about adhering to the Prime Directive?"
Xander answered before either Willow or Buffy could stop him. "We need a Danger Room. And since the Shi'ar don't actually exist or anything, and none of us are multi-millionaires . . ."
"You thought you'd get us to be your janitors and techies, huh?" Marco snapped.
"No!" Willow insisted, actually getting angry at being accused like that. "We thought we'd /ask/ you if you would be /willing/ to help us! We won't force anyone to do anything."
"Look," Buffy interrupted, "You all came here for answers about what really happened on Halloween. We've told you what happened, and even some reasons as to why it happened. After this, for all we care, you all can go your own way. Maybe we can help each other every now and again if anybody gets into any kind of trouble, but we don't owe you anything and you don't owe us anything. Now if you still want to meet after school and talk some more about how things /really/ work in the world, then you're still welcome to come, but like Will said, we're not forcing anyone."
"We'll still come, we're just trying to determine your intentions," Jake told them. When Marco and a few of the others looked to protest, he glared at them and said a bit louder, "We'll come to talk, and that's all for the moment. And just because between the six of us we /could/ build a Galaxy-Class starship, that doesn't mean we will or that we even have the resources to do it either."
"But if all you want is a Holodeck, we may not even have the resources to do that," Tobias pointed out.
"What exactly would you need?" Joyce asked, then smile mischievously. "You'd be amazed at what all magic can get you."
"And what Joyce can't get, I can, provided Scott wishes for it," Amy added.
"Yeah, and hey, if we're talking about heavy equipment, I can shove it around like nobody's business!" Pete began to get involved with the mounting excitement in the room.
"Hey! Hulk's not the only super-strong superhero at our disposal!" Kevin protested, getting pretty excited himself.
"So . . . we're all going to meet after school?" Buffy confirmed.
Everyone agreed, but Mark raised his hand to ask a question, "Uh, would it be OK if we brought a few . . . others? I tried to talk them into coming with me here, but they didn't want to. Kinda scared."
The X-Slayerettes exchanged a few glances, all thinking the same thing/'How big was this going to get?'/ Instead they just shrugged and nodded to Mark that it was OK.
Just then, the school bell rung, causing everyone to jump to their feet.
"Uh, OK, come back at lunch and Giles will have the address of the lot ready for everyone," Willow announced as everyone scrambled to gather their things and began to race to class, the elementary students rushing even faster as they had to get back to their own school first. "See you all again this afternoon!"
Moments later only the adults, Giles, Jenny Calendar, and Joyce Summers were left in the Round Table Library.
"But . . . my Library," Giles whimpered.
"Oh don't worry about it Rupert," Joyce scoffed and then waved her hand at the table and instantly it reverted back to it's normal long-table form. "It's only genie-magic. Not exactly difficult to reverse, let alone manipulate. Amy really should get some training however. Even low-level genies can use their magic outside of wishes, and she hasn't demonstrated that yet. Anyway, Buffy already told me where we'll meet, so I'll see you later Rupert. Miss Calendar, it was lovely to meet you."
"You too Joyce," the gypsy nodded, though her accent had disappeared with her costume, she had finally admitted that she really was of gypsy decent.
"Toodles," the sorceress/witch waved her hand before disappearing.
"I need a drink," Giles mumbled, walking into his office, while Jenny quickly left to go to her own class.
After School; Abandoned Junk Yard
Buffy lead the way into the yard, her and Cordy easily taking care of the rusted fences, pushing them out of the way in order to admit the large group that followed. Besides the Star Fleet kids, the other X-Slayerettes + adults (Giles, Jenny, and Joyce), the Cordettes - Harmony, Scott and Amy, Mark, Sydney and Iczel, Kevin had already transformed into Prime and there were three new additions, friends of Mark. They'd been introduced as Jamie, Russ, and Robin, Mark's two best friends and his girlfriend. They hadn't revealed what abilities, if any, they'd gotten from costumes they'd worn, again if they'd worn any at all on Halloween night.
For some reason Pete and Debbie hadn't shown up, but Buffy hadn't expected all of them to.
Leading the way, heading for the small little shack they'd found in the center of the yard, the mutant Slayer fiddled with her crimson sunglasses a bit. Something was making her twitchy, and not just the fact that her mother was here, or even the fact that she tended every now and again to hear Willow's private thoughts, (or at least the thoughts that were about Buffy herself). It was something else.
"Gosh! What is that smell!" Prime exclaimed, holding his hand over his nose.
"Yeah, we're going to have to find out what's causing that. Rusted metal and junk like this doesn't typically smell," Buffy agreed.
Just as they were passing the last turn that would put them almost right in front of the shack, Buffy stopped solid, several of the others behind her bumping into her, but the Slayer didn't move so much as an inch after stopping.
"Buffy, what . . . ?" Willow asked, and then they all noticed what the Slayer already had.
Standing right in front of the shack was a group of nine individuals, and right out in front was Harmony Kendall, in yet another tight black leather outfit, sword in hand.
"Time we finish what we started Cordelia!" she screamed.
"Crap," Buffy cursed, her eyes dancing over the group arrayed before them.
"OK, she's seriously gone off the deep end now," Brittany commented as she pulled out her own blade.
Willow's eyes were dancing just as much as Buffy's until her eyes locked onto one individual in particular, her mind almost reeling with the amount of pure psychic force she felt radiating off of the boy she was looking at. "Cassie, raise your shields and protect everyone that you can, I'll cover the rest!" she ordered.
The Betazoid nodded and a strain of concentration masked her face, and to make sure she pulled her friends, Scott, and the few others that had no hope of properly defending themselves closer to her.
"Who are you people, what are you doing here?" Buffy shouted out.
"Meet my new friends loser," Harmony crowed. "They'll make sure nobody can interfere this time while I take Cordelia down!"
"Is she obsessed or something?" Xander asked the white-striped brunette.
"Uh, saying yes would be an understatement," the Rogue mutant responded.
"Allow me to do the introductions," an older man, maybe 30, 35 years old stepped forward, next to Harmony, and holding her shoulder to keep her quiet. "I am the Gamesmaster, and I would like to play a game with you and mine and Harmony's new friends. The eight of you willing to fight, against the eight fighters I have gathered here against you. The stakes are really quite simple, whoever wins maintains control over this ground, and decides who gets to die and who doesn't. And on the off chance that you do not play . . ."
One of the younger individuals, a boy no more than 8 or 9 years old suddenly began to fly several feet of the ground, his eyes glowing a burning red, highly similar though subtly different from when Buffy's eyes sparked with crimson energy. No doubt it was well within the boy's powers to shoot laser beams from his eyes, on top of flying there was no way for anyone else to know what all he could do just yet.
Another young boy shouted out a word, "SHAZAM!" before a bolt of lightning came down and in the boys place was a BIG man in a red and gold uniform, a giant lightning bolt on his chest. Even Buffy, one of the more fictionally-challenged of the group, recognized Captain Marvel when she saw him.
Three others stood out against the rest, mostly because of the way they were dressed and how they looked in general. One was all in green and had metal gauntlets visible on his arms, while the other two, who could have been brothers, were all in black, looking pale and if not for the bulging veins and red-eyes, making them look like they hadn't gotten any sleep since Halloween, most would think they were a pair of vampires. These two also carried familiar-looking metal hilts at their waists, but if these were weapons or not, no one could tell at the moment.
Once Gamesmaster made his threat however, the one in green put a familiar looking metal-bolted mask over his smooth un-scarred face and did something to his gauntlets to reveal several weapons coming out of them. The other two held out their hands and the two hilts at their waists practically flew into them before they activated with a snap-hiss, revealing them as two crimson lightsabres.
"Well," the Gamesmaster finished up, "I'm sure you can figure it out."
"Any rules to this game of yours?" Buffy growled out, getting into a ready stance.
"No running away, the battles must take place in this lot, and no sideline help. If one of your extras decides to interfere, they should be involved from the beginning," the man snapped out. "Now . . . begin!"
TBC...