Disclaimer: See Chapter 1
--
Willow groaned and clutched her head as she sat up. She felt so groggy, like she needed to sleep for a couple days. She tried to look at her surroundings, but found that her vision was too blurry to make out anything. She blinked several times and her vision started to return. All around her she could see kids running wildly, terrified.
She tried to stand, but then felt something fall out of her lap. Sitting on the porch below her were nineteen cards. Each of them bore the picture of various people and objects. The back of each card was red with a five pointed star over top of a six pointed star. The corners of the cards had small trees. Willow quickly gathered them up and reached for her wand.
She was astounded to see that it had changed as well. It had turned the same shade of red as the cards. The star in the center had its points hollowed out, making it look much more like a pentacle. The wings on the sides had changed, one white and the other black.
"You'd think I'd be used to stuff like this by now," she said.
She got up quickly and picked up a nearby empty candy sack. She stuffed her wand and cards into it. She ran off of the porch and out into the lawn, looking for Buffy and Xander. She started to walk in the direction of Buffy's house when she heard something behind her.
She turned to see a vampire looming over her. She reached for her wand to hit it when a blade suddenly emerged from his chest. He stared down at it before collapsing to its knees. Whoever had stabbed it pulled the sword out of it.
Willow looked up in shock to see Xander in real armor. He began a swing to decapitate the vampire.
"No! Xander, it's a kid!" she yelled.
He seemed to ignore her, his blade continuing its path.
Without realizing what she was doing, she reached into her bag and pulled out her wand and a card. The card floated in the air in front of her and she slammed her wand against it.
"Shield!" she shouted.
Instantly a wing shaped shield with a red jewel in the middle of it appeared between Xander's sword and the vampire just before he struck. The vampire looked up and realized it hadn't been dusted. It leapt to its feet despite its flesh wound and rushed past Willow.
"Okay, what just happened?" Willow mumbled.
"Vile sorceress!" Xander spat, pointing his sword at her, "Why do you defend that foul demon who assailed you?"
"Xander, it's me, Willow! I'm not a sorceress, I'm not sure how I just did that, but I'm not!"
"I am not this 'Xander' of which you speak. I am Sir Alexander the White and I do not hold company with witches! Consider it fortuitous that I would not strike down a woman, even if she was Satan's bitch."
The last part caused Willow's jaw to drop. Satan's bitch?
"Now I must be off. There are innocents that I must save, as is my duty as a knight."
He turned to walk off and Willow grabbed his arm.
"Xander, stop!"
"That's not going to do you any good, he has no idea who he is," said someone behind them.
They turned to see Buffy walking up to them. She looked odd, though. Her eyes were now an odd gold color and her ears were pointy like an elf. There were also strange reddish marks under her ears and a blue crescent moon on her forehead.
"Buffy! You remember you are?" Willow asked.
"I have access to her memories while inhabiting this body, I'm not your friend, but you may refer to me as her for convenience's sake," she replied, traces of an accent in her voice "I believe we should finish what I have to do and then quickly undo this mess. I have no real interest in the lives of these humans, but I believe my granddaughter would be quite upset if I allowed the ones she is sworn to protect to come to harm. Even if she can resurrect them with Tenseiga."
"Unhand me!" Xander shouted, jerking his arm free of Willow's grasp.
"Humans," said 'Buffy,' rolling her eyes.
In blur she was standing in front of Xander. He stood amazed for a second and then suddenly collapsed into a heap.
"Carry him," she ordered Willow.
"What did you do to him?!"
"He's fine," she replied, "He's just knocked out. Now carry him."
"There's no way I can lift him!"
"Use one of those cards like you did before."
"I don't know how I did that!"
'Buffy' sighed, leaned over, and picked up Xander bridal style. Willow would've been amazed if she didn't already know how strong Buffy was, but it was still a bit of a strange sight.
"Are you coming?"
Willow quickly followed after her.
"Um, where are we going?" Willow asked.
"We have some tasks to accomplish before the night is over and I have to return to the world of the dead. My granddaughter won't retain enough of my memories to do them herself."
"About that, are you really her grandmother?"
"In a roundabout way, I am Sesshomaru's mother. He used to have nothing but disdain for humans, but then he adopted that girl. She certainly changed him, made him more like his father in some respects. He's really taken an interest in this girl."
"Can you tell me about him? Sesshomaru, I mean. Buffy's been trying to find out as much as she can about him."
Sesshomaru's mother paused for a moment, thinking. Willow looked at her expectantly.
Then she shook her head.
"No, I think it would be better if I didn't. My son would be very displeased with me if I revealed too much at this point."
"Revealed too much of what?"
The woman turned her head and looked at Willow with a sly smile.
"That would be telling," she replied.
So they continued on their course, Willow mostly silent, worried about both of her friends. A few times some monsters tried to attack them, but a hard look and a snarl from Sesshomaru's mother was all it took to scare them off. Willow found this a bit odd and decided it would be best not to cross her if they were so scared of her.
Finally they reached their destination: Buffy's house. They walked up onto the porch and stopped.
"What are we doing here?" Willow inquired.
"I need to write a message. This seemed like a good place to do it."
"Shouldn't we be out there saving people or something? I mean there are an awful lot of monsters out and about."
"You're free to help them, I suppose, but I daresay that would be futile unless you learn to use those cards."
"It's not going to do any good to ask you to do it, is it?"
"No, now will you get the door. I appear to have my hands full."
Willow sidestepped the supernatural noblewoman and reached for the doorknob. She opened it to find a dark, empty house. Willow walked in and Sesshomaru's mother followed after. She dumped Xander's unconscious body unceremoniously on the couch and went to get some paper and something to write with. Willow paced nervously in front of the couch, still worried that Xander might be seriously hurt while Sesshomaru's mother awkwardly wrote Japanese characters with a ballpoint pen, a writing utensil she was clearly not used to using.
She looked over the letter a few times, seemed satisfied that she had written everything that needed to be written, and stuffed it in an envelope. She sealed the envelope, got up and handed it to Willow.
"I'm entrusting you to ensure that this is delivered," she said.
The envelope was addressed to someone named Jiro Inuno in San Francisco with Buffy's address written in the corner as the return address.
"Who's Jiro Inuno and why are you sending him a letter?" Willow asked.
Sesshomaru's mother sighed and replied, "You ask an awful lot of questions, don't you? All I can say is that he's going to be very helpful to you and your friends in a few years, if he doesn't run off immediately after getting that letter, that is. He's been hiding out from everyone for the past few centuries and probably won't want to get involved."
"Wait, centuries? Is this guy some kind of demon or something?"
"That's it, no more questions. You're starting to irritate me. Now let's go, we need to find the Watcher so that I can back to where I belong. This world just isn't a place for purebloods like me anymore."
"We can't just leave Xander here," Willow insisted.
"He'll be fine. He'll probably be back to normal before he wakes up, no worse for wear."
--
Giles took a sip from the cup of steaming tea beside him. There were various books and papers scattered on the table in front of him. He had decided to use the supernatural activity free night of Halloween to compile and organize everything he could find out about Spike (aka William the Bloody) and about Tenseiga. So far it had proved to be a bit more of a daunting task than he had originally anticipated. The ugly visage of Death looking over his shoulder didn't help matters either.
"Ripper, do you have anymore apples?" it asked.
Giles, tired and irritated with having to put up with the shinigami, turned to give him an exasperated look. The creature behind him was a very odd sight, a pale creature with spiky black hair, yellow eyes with red pupils and no irises, black markings around his eyes, an upturned nose with slit-like nostrils, blue lips, and sharp pointy teeth. He was wearing a black outfit that was feathery around the shoulders and could only be described as BDSM.
"You ate them all Ryuk," Giles replied impatiently, "Isn't there anywhere else you can be right now?"
"Nice try," Ryuk said, "but you and I both know that I have to haunt the owner of the Death Note until they relinquish ownership of it or I write their name in my own Death Note. I know there's no way you'll give up your Death Note, you're too afraid it might fall into the wrong hands and things are getting too interesting for me to kill you. In fact, why don't you go for a walk and see if anything's going on tonight."
"Nothing ever happens on Halloween," Giles said dismissively, beginning to go back to his work.
However, something in Ryuk's tone of voice caused him to pause. You don't spend all day every day for several decades with an entity and not learn their mannerisms.
"Is there something you aren't telling me, Ryuk?"
"I just think it would do you some good to take in the night air."
"Something's going on, isn't it?" Giles asked.
Ryuk gave a small chuckle in response.
"Ryuk!" Giles shouted, getting up, "It must be something big for you to be able to sense it, now what is it?! Tell me or you'll never see another apple while I have that Death Note!"
This seemed to give Ryuk pause. Giles knew the shinigami wouldn't be willing to give up his apples over this and it wasn't like he was breaking any rules (that Giles knew of, anyway) by telling him. He just tried to be as obstinate as possible to make things more interesting for himself.
"Fine," Ryuk said after some contemplation, "Someone's cast some kind of spell, a big one by the feeling. I can tell it involves chaos magic and whoever did it probably invoked the god of chaos to do it."
"Ethan," Giles muttered, "I should've known he wouldn't be content to leave me alone. I'll have to go find him and put a stop to whatever he's doing. Can you lead me to him?"
Before Ryuk could reply, someone came into the doors. Giles only hoped whoever it was hadn't heard him talking to Ryuk and thought he was talking to himself. Luckily for him, it was just Willow, looking quite odd in her sailor outfit with pink hair, followed by Buffy, who looked different, but was still very recognizable. Clutched fearfully to Buffy's arm was Cordelia, wearing a slightly ripped unitard with lopsided cat ears on her head.
"Giles, something's wrong!" Willow announced, "Everyone's turned into their costumes and I'm the only one who remembers who I really am! Xander's turned into some kind of knight and Buffy's become her own ancestor and…"
She broke off from her long winded speech and looked at Cordelia. Meanwhile, Buffy seemed to stare directly at Ryuk and raised an eyebrow, but said nothing. Giles automatically dismissed it as coincidence. After all, only someone who had touched the Death Note could see the shinigami.
"Cordelia, you don't think you're a cat, do you?" she asked.
"No, of course not," Cordy replied, starting to regain a bit of her composure, then she turned her head to look at her butt, "I'm not gonna grow a tail, am I?"
"Okay, so Cordelia stayed normal," Willow said, ignoring her, "Why isn't she affected?"
"Cordelia, where did you get your costume?" Giles asked, starting to get some suspicions.
"Partytown," she replied, "I…"
"And Willow, where did you and Buffy get yours?" he asked, cutting off Cordelia's inevitable spiel.
"A new place, Ethan's," Willow answered.
Instantly it all fell into place. Giles didn't know what the point of all this was, perhaps it had no point, chaos was often like that, but regardless had to stop his old friend. He hastily went to his desk and opened a drawer. At the very bottom, buried under various books and papers, was a manila envelope. He opened it and took out a single sheet of blank paper with the letters D and N written in the corners. He also grabbed spare pen and scribbled the name 'Ethan' on it. That should save him some time in a pinch.
Ryuk gave a hearty laugh at his preparations.
"Willow, I'll need directions to this shop. I want you all to wait here for me. I won't be gone long," he said.
--
Giles pushed open the door to Ethan's door with Ryuk hovering behind him on those black feathery wings. It had taken quite a bit of effort to convince Willow that he should go alone. He had to lie and say that it was possible whoever had cast the spell could control anyone wearing one of his costumes. He knew sooner or later they would most likely learn of his…youthful indiscretions, but he wasn't ready for Ethan to reveal everything to them.
Inside, his old friend appeared to have been waiting for him, standing among his unsold stock. The chaos sorcerer spread his arms wide.
"What, no hug?" Ethan asked, "Aren't you happy to see me again? It's been ages!"
"Undo the spell and get out of town," Giles said coldly, putting his pen to the page of his Death Note, "Or I'll kill you right here and now. I only need to write Rayne."
"Straight to business, I see," Ethan commented, "Back in the old days you would've found this the epitome of fun. A very literal case of be careful what you wish for."
"It's sick, twisted and harms the innocent. I won't stand for it."
"Still playing at Watcher, I see. The tweed clad guardian of the Slayer. That's not who you really are, you and I both know it. I've seen the darkness in you, Ripper. I know what you're capable of. Do you think the Slayer would be so accepting if she knew half the things you've done? She'd probably never speak to you again."
"He's got a point, you know," Ryuk interjected, "you guys toyed with some things that scared even me."
"Thank you, Ryuk," Ethan said.
Giles, no longer able to contain his fury, delivered a swift kick Ethan's groin. He slumped over in pain, gripping his crotch. Giles took the opportunity to slug him right across the face. Ethan fell into a rack of costumes causing them to fall onto him.
"How do I break the spell?"
"Say 'pretty please.'"
Giles kicked Ethan across the face as hard as possible. Some blood and several teeth flew out. He placed his foot on the chaos sorcerer's throat and reached again for the Death Note page.
"How do I break the spell?"
"Break the bust," Ethan coughed.
Giles strode over to the two headed bust of the god Janus, lifted it up over his head, and threw it down, smashing it.
--
Back at Buffy's house, Xander slept as his sword and armor became fake once more and Sir Alexander the White again became nothing more than an invention of his imagination. He wouldn't even remember in the morning that he had beaten Larry the pirate to a pulp right before seeing Willow again.
--
Buffy suddenly found color returning to her world. She was once again in the meadow she had been before she had passed out before. Again that woman in her costume was standing before her.
"It's done," she said, "Your body is yours once again. I'm afraid it's a bit different than when you left it, but there's nothing that can be done about it now."
Buffy was about to question her further when her vision blurred and she felt dizzy. Suddenly she found herself staring at the blurry image of Willow.
"Are you okay?" Willow asked, "Are you Buffy again?"
The Slayer nodded, "It's me, Will."
She reached up to take off her wig. As it came off her head, Willow gasped.
"What's wrong?" Buffy demanded.
"Um, well," Willow said, then turned, "Cordelia, do you have a compact?"
"Yeah," Queen C replied, retrieving it from a small pocket in her unitard "why do you…oh, wow, you definitely didn't get through this Halloween thing too well."
Confused, Buffy snatched the compact from Cordelia's hand. As she opened it, she vaguely wondered if her nails had always been so long and sharp looking. She stared at her face for a second, it looked normal. Then she noticed her eyes. They were no longer their normal hazel, but gold. She pulled the compact back to look at her hair and despite her wig being off (she double checked to be sure) it was still very much white. The final shock came when she spotted the furry ears on top of her head.
"WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO ME?!"
--
Back the Warehouse, Spike and Drusilla sat curled up together on couch watching a television, both of which they had had some minions steal from local stores the previous night. Between them was a bowl of popcorn. Closer inspection revealed that the popcorn was coated not with butter, but blood from a fresh victim. The red fluid stuck to their fingers as they ate.
Spike had to admit he felt a bit like a coward for staying in tonight, but he had learned that when Drusilla warns someone about something, it's in their best interest to heed her. So they had stayed in and were currently watching A Nightmare on Elm Street. The movie was coming to its conclusion with the protagonist entering a car that is revealed to the possessed by the killer.
"Bloody hell," said Spike, "I think that was the most boring hour and a half of my life. Humans actually find this rubbish scary. I'd love to show them what real fear is."
"Spike," intoned Drusilla, "Do you think the man will visit me in my dreams? We can have tea and cakes and I'll tell him what a good girl I've been. He'll have to bring me present."
"You're thinking of Santa, Dru."
"Will you get me a kitten for Christmas, Spike? My mum never let me have pets, said they were."
"Of course, Princess," Spike replied, knowing full well she wouldn't be able to care for a kitten.
Drusilla paused for a moment, as if listening to something. She began to sway, the let out an earsplitting scream. She grabbed her head and fell to the floor. She convulsed wildly while Spike knelt at her side, trying to calm her down.
At last, the screaming and convulsions stopped. She stood up, her eyes rolled back and tears pouring forth. She spoke in a strong confident voice.
"Heaven shall burn and Hell shall freeze. All that was meant to be shall be meaningless. The cards have turned, the girl has become a dog, and the monster has awakened. Next the goddess shall come and the angel shall go below and become a god. Then the demon will come and take goddess's place. The key shall come and turn to sand. The One Who Sees shall watch and wait. All else is in shadow and shall not be known until it comes to be."
--
Author's Note:
I decided to go ahead and submit this early since I've got it done. I'll probably start updating my stories at random times now that I'm juggling two big ones and two drabble series. I've also got two plot bunnies in my head, but I'm forcing myself to not let them see the light of day until I can get those stories finished.