Inside the costume shop, a faint breeze brushed against the remaining magic-imbued outfits that hadn't been sold, with this mild gust of wind coming through the massive opening in the front of the building that Xander had created to enter and confront Ethan Rayne. Fortunately, nobody was currently around this deserted area of Sunnydale to gape at the missing part of that structure, or to look inside to see the back of an immobile figure there holding something up in their hands. This breeze also gently stirred the tie of the formal suit that Xander was still wearing, an action totally ignored in the teenager's frantic thoughts as he despairingly worked out the consequences of his next actions, whatever they were.
Break the statue, and all those affected by the Chaos magic in their costumes would return to normal. Including Xander. He'd been changed into Richard Wilkins III, Mayor of Sunnydale, by the strip of cloth acquired from this very place and made into a sash proudly proclaiming the wearer was indeed a MAYOR, and also by owning a business card signed by that man himself, with this little scrap of paper somehow also being permeated by the spell cast by the Janus statue.
Break the statue, and Xander would at once change back to his usual ordinary, human self, with the same face and body he'd had all his life before this Halloween. True, that also meant something else: his mental interloper, the Primal animal spirit known as Hyena, would also return to existence inside his mind, still confined there and not happy about this whatsoever. Yet, given the exact kind of awful luck he'd been having all night, this wasn't the very worse thing that would happen to Xander.
Break the statue, and Mayor Wilkins would also return to life in his office at City Hall.
Hopelessly going through his memories that were currently also the memories of the undying evil sorcerer that had ruthlessly controlled the Sunnydale Hellmouth for a century, Xander dully noted that there wasn't anything in there to indicate either way if Wilkins would even remember being absorbed by the teenager right after the Chaos spell had been cast, and what had then occurred. Or if Xander himself would remember anything after the statue was smashed. Like it mattered. The Mayor would certainly recollect how he'd been mystically affected by something earlier tonight, and that man would instantly use his magic to find out what.
Further guided by his memories, a nauseous Xander could mentally see it all now. Once he finally had time to study things, Wilkins would promptly identify the presence of Chaos magic in his city. Not only that, throughout the entire town of Sunnydale, there would be the signs of massive usage of Hellmouth energies, and the Mayor would damn well know he hadn't done this! Which led to the next step: Who?
Gulping, Xander paused in his thoughts to gently replace the Janus statue onto the register counter, to then take a step back and stand there, his shoulders slumping in utter dejection as he resignedly continued inside his head. A simple scrying spell by the Mayor - something that Xander himself hadn't had the least bit trouble with! - and the pair of troublemakers responsible for everything tonight would be immediately located, and a very furious sorcerer would teleport himself from his office right into the costume shop, eager to get on with the upcoming interrogations that would not end happily for Xander and Ethan. To be precise, both of them would be promptly executed afterwards.
To the fatalistic teenager beginning to sway upon his feet, the only thing unclear about his coming demise was merely how much it was going to hurt. Of course, Ethan's own death would be the result of that mage's actions, simply for daring to come into the Mayor's territory and then setting off his little Halloween joke. It wouldn't make the slightest difference to Wilkins that the Englishman hadn't intended at all for his spell to affect the master of Sunnydale. Nor would the fact that Xander Harris was a truly innocent victim either, or that this high school student was going to be the last casualty of tonight's events.
There was absolutely no possibility of any other outcome for Xander. Not when Wilkins would rip from the younger man's brain every single memory of what he'd done and learned tonight. Including the sorcerer's plans to soon become an Old One, a pure-breed demon that would devastate the world. Even if Xander had totally forgotten everything about becoming the Mayor when the Chaos magic was ended by the Janus statue's destruction, just the chance - much less the actuality that had happened tonight - of him indeed finding out this secret meant that Wilkins would kill Xander without a second's thought. That politician had done far worse in the past to a lot more people over the faintest prospect of his privacies becoming discovered, as an appalled Xander straightaway learned from his memories.
Gagging over this, Xander shuddered and crossed his arms over his chest as if for warmth, shifting on his feet to turn his gaze away from that little figurine on the counter that was his doom. A soft, snorting sound coming from the floor sent Xander's panicked gaze downwards, to see Ethan still lying there subsist back into his magical slumber. Glaring at the insensible guy whose fault it totally was regarding everything that had happened tonight, the features of the mature man standing there in his formal suit abruptly contorted in surprise, and then into cautious hope.
Here was somebody who knew about Chaos magic. Maybe, just maybe, Ethan had something in his head that could fix things- Instantly pointing a finger at the man resting on the floor, a suddenly-optimistic Xander brought up from his mind the proper spell, and as he carefully lowered his magical shields the merest fraction, the teenager cast the enchantment, with a small, glowing ball of light then bursting from this fingertip to zoom right at Ethan's skull, landing there to painlessly sink through hair, skin, and bone out of sight. Waiting patiently, his finger still pointing, Xander watched for a few seconds, until he was rewarded by seeing the ball of light reappear from the same point on the seemingly-unaffected Englishman's head, lifting itself from there to again fly through the air unerringly at its target, the very same fingertip from where it had been cast.
Reabsorbing his spell now filled with Ethan's memories that mainly had to do with Chaos magic, Xander stood there frozen for a moment, until his eyes bulged, that young man staggered back a few steps, and then he abruptly bent over to clutch at his heaving stomach. His head still hanging downwards, Xander groaned to the floor, "Great googly moogly! Like I really needed to see G-man dressed up in women's underwear! Funny, I'd have expected him to be a Rocky Horror fan of Brad or the Criminologist, not anybody else."
Gingerly straightening up, Xander scrubbed hard at his face, as if trying to wipe away the few truly distressing memories that had randomly come along with the desired recollections. Concentrating on these, Xander's mood gradually became gloomier, as nothing seemed to help. *So, he was friends with Giles back in merry England, and he just showed up here?* "Shit! He didn't even know about the Mayor or anything else, just about the Hellmouth, and that his spell would work better here!" *Got a bunch of costumes, met Buffy, saw she was the Slayer and learned about Giles, had a good laugh about him being her Watcher and that she'd likely get killed in her noblewoman's costume-* "Asshole!" *Uh, yeah, breaking the statue will end the spell and change everyone back, me included, but nothing how to stop the Mayor, dammit!* "You stupid fucker, I hope he wakes you up and kills you first, so I can at least see that before it's my turn!"