Draw the line

Got home late again because I was finishing up some stuff at work, especially since tomorrow will always have its own set of problems. Went to get grocery and was walking home with armloads of stuff when one of the bags containing glass bottles slipped and just smashed on the ground.

For a stupefied few seconds I just stood there staring at the ground brain dead wondering what I should do. It was only when a young boy walked up to me and started helping to clear the fragments of the glass bottles that I realised I have to do something.

I am tired, drained and upset and I realised one important thing as I walked back home. There’s no point working so hard, I got the same amount of pay doing a shit load of work. I spend my evenings rushing work when I could knock off and enjoy my week day evenings. For what? More criticism and no appreciation? Totally exhausted when I reached home unable to do what I wanted?

That one moment when my brain just froze and I was unable to comprehend the situation, I realised that I have enough. Work is work, my life is my life. I am not being paid to bear such a large amount of work, and I am not going to use my health to do so much for a work place that I am probably going to quit pretty soon.

I have enough. I am drawing the line tonight, and tomorrow I am going to request for an exact job description of what I am supposed to do and what I am paid to do. And if they want to squeeze more out of me, I am going to tell them straight to their faces to suck it up.

Book 2: Order of the Silver Hand (Chapter Two)

Had a pretty upsetting day at work. I sink in so much effort to meet customers’ needs and in the end still remained unappreciated. Sometimes I wondered why the hell I do so much at work for such ungrateful people, and why the hell do I need to do so much when honestly, a lot of the things are above and beyond my job scope and pay grade since I am assisting supervisory job level with no visible compensations and benefits, but lots of bad attitudes from people. Sometimes I really feel WTF as well as the urge to throw in my letter.

And in times like this I turn to writing to bring back my peace of mind. I managed to complete the new chapter for the Order of the Silver Hand. It’s still a bit raw, but I’ll get back to changing any spelling mistakes once I have the time.

Cheerios guys! Let me know if you spot any mistakes or discrepancies, and leave a review if possible. I’ll really like some feedback

OoooO

Story Title: Order of the Silver Hand

Crossover: BtVS/ Warcraft III/ Stargate/ Stargate Universe/ Multiple

Disclaimer: I do not own, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Warcraft games verse, Stargate TV verse, or any other fandoms I will be dabbling in. This is a work of fan fiction, written without profit, for the enjoyment of fans of these great fandoms.

Summary: He is the One who can Build Anything. He is the heir to Magic. Bestowed with great powers, yet at the same time crippled by it, he will change the universe.

Chapter Two: Building the Foundation

Six hours ago, within Accendia …

A hearty breakfast, and Xander sat in quiet meditation in his room as he slipped deep into the connection he had with Accendia, the space station they were now on. The station had basically been set to auto-pilot, allowing most of the more important and integral tasks to be done by the station’s intuitive automated programs. As a culture, the Alterans had been uncomfortable with creating artificial intelligences, though if Lauger’s database back on Earth was true, things were slightly different for the Lanteans. The most the Alterans did was to create artificial life that seemed intelligent, but were actually not, like the servitors that took care of the station’s manual tasks.

A large and complex unit like the Accendia had hundreds of internal tasks and programs running at a time. Though two days or so had already passed on the station, Xander had been kept so busy or distracted that he did not have much time to really sink deep into Accendia’s mechanical conscious and micro-manage her. The most he had done had been to command her to give him access to her database and the information within her.

Though he might be a magical vampire, his brain was still based on a mortal human, unable to comprehend the hundreds of tasks that were running within Accendia at anytime. So Xander did the next best thing, narrowing down to his objectives. Sweeping away the clutter of many of Accendia’s on-going tasks, Xander swam deep into Accendia’s navigational networks, seizing control of her scanners. With a thought, he commanded Accendia to scan its surroundings for any habitable planets within six hundred and thirty light years which was her maximum scan range.

The scans would take several hours to complete, thus Xander withdrew his control of Accendia and instead sank into the bond of the second Accendia which had been created and parked several hundred miles away from the Accendia that his Order had made their base in. Mentally he named it Semita just to differentiate between the two stations that were replicas of each other.

Trying to get Accendia ready to house those of his Order who wanted to help him establish his space base, and assigning tasks to his Order who had arrived actually took up most of his attention for the entirety of yesterday. That was why he was only turning his attention to Semita now, to check on some of her ships who had already been sent out on exploration journeys.

Xander had previously sent out thirteen of the Capital ships to various deep space and planetary locations. There had been several Alteran outposts Lauger had listed in his compendium that would be useful to Xander if he could locate and repair them. Lauger had also noted locations where he thought other Lanteans, who had left the enclave and never Ascended, might have went. All in all, Xander had thirty-two locations in total to investigate.

And with Accendia’s database fully repaired and functional, Xander now had a list of all the worlds and bases where the Alterans used to set up their civilizations in the long ago past. If he were to add those locations into consideration, there were thousands of worlds and old Alteran bases which Xander could send his team to investigate and explore, that was of course assuming if even a shred of those structures survived the millions of years.

Right now, Angel and the Paladin Jestina were taking care of the Order’s operations on Earth. Tain, Yalen, and Ian were helping him to upgrade Accendia here. But he would need to set up several exploration teams to help him investigate the galaxy at large, as well as prospecting for a habitable new planet for the Order.

Concentrating on the ships he had already sent out, he linked to them. All thirteen of the Capital ships had already reached their various destinations in the hours that had passed since their launch. Of the ten ships sent to investigate structures out in deep space, seven reported no signs of any Alteran ruins. It was more than likely that cosmic decay or stellar debris had already destroyed them. These seven ships were sent to investigate new locations, continuing Xander’s search for old Alteran structures.

As for the three ships sent to planetary bodies, two have detected sustainable human populations living on the planets. One of the ships was being bombarded with communication signals from the humans of the planet it was orbiting over. Apparently the humans of that planet possessed significantly advanced technologies and already possessed space capable ships. They were apparently also a peaceful race as they had pretty much left the capital ship in orbit over their planet alone despite numerous failed attempts to make contact with it.

With a quick command, Xander ordered the ship to move away from the planet, to take up orbit around the closest uninhabited planet in the solar system. Xander was not yet ready to make contact with an alien race, even if it was an alien human race.

As for the second ship which had discovered a human populated planet, Xander had discovered that the ship in orbit over the planet was currently attacked by an armanda of sixty over starships. According to the ship’s logs, the attack had begun two hours ago and had already depleted the ship’s powerful shields by forty-five percent. The reason why Xander was not informed of the attack was because the ship had not yet suffered any physical damage which would have triggered the ship’s navigational program to send a distress signal to Semita.

Quickly Xander commanded the ship to return to Semita until further instruction. He had no wish to engage in interstellar warfare until he was ready for it. Having already located three planets and discovering two of them containing civilizations with advanced technologies, Xander realised belatedly that he needed to be more cautious in his exploration ventures.  He needed more information about the states of affairs in the galaxy before recklessly exploring every inch of it.

It took a few minutes before he came to a decision. Reaching deep into his connection with the other twelve Capital ships still in space, Xander recalled the seven Capital ships which had been sent on further exploration journeys, stopping them from continuing their tasks. Instead he ordered them to return back to Semita. The other Capital ship which had discovered the peaceful human civilization was also ordered to return.

Of the three Capital ships who had managed to find Alteran ruins in deep space and the one Capital ship which was now in orbit over an uninhabited planet containing the location of an alleged Lantean outpost, Xander left them alone for the moment. He planned to send exploration teams to their locations soon. But for the moment, they were safe from detection by any forms of alien civilizations.

Though the Order currently numbered two thousand and three hundred over members, most of the task force were still needed on Earth to maintain peace and stability. Even with the two hundred and forty seven Order members on Accendia, he would be spread thin trying to manage a large space operation. There was really no other choice. He would have to create more Order members and increase his space venture task force.

With his manipulation of the Capital ships done, Xander pulled back from his connection with Semita, returning back to consciousness. Rising up from stiff knees, Xander walked out of his room. The new day was still young, and there was a lot he still needed to do. Starting with finding Tain, Yalen and Ian to discuss what new followers should he call into being, to aid in his quest to explore space, find a new home for his Order, and to free any civilizations enslaved by alien races.

OoooO

Six hours ago, on the Planet Tollan …

“You are certain that the unknown ship had since left our solar system?” Travell asked as she looked at her aid who had just rushed into her office from the communications room.

“Yes High Chancellor.” Her aid said with a bow. “After three hours of its arrival over our planet, while refusing to answer any of our attempts at communications, it finally made way for the planet Iria before changing course and jumping into some sort of unidentified faster than light travel that does not tap into hyperspace.”

“It tried to go to Iria first?” Travell questioned with a frown. “That planet is just a hunk of frozen rock. I would have thought it would investigate Sarita first since it was the only planet other than our own to be inhabited. Did our ships get anything off the scans of the foreign ship?”

“Unfortunately High Chancellor, our ships’ scanners were unable to penetrate much into the foreign ship’s powerful shields. All we got was that the shields were incredibly powerful, capable of surviving entry into a star’s atmosphere, much less an attack by our weapons. We also detected metallic traces of the ship’s hull…” Her aid paused reading the information in her info-pad, before looking at Travell wide eyed. “The scientists are saying that the ship was constructed of the same blend of metal as the ancient outpost discovered on our planet centuries ago. They are talking about the same outpost that increased our technological level by leaps and bounds throughout the past centuries.”

Travell narrowed her eyes. “You’re saying that the ship was constructed by the same beings that built the old outpost?”

“The scientists are saying that it is possible. It could also be possible that another civilization had found a ship created by them and had copied their designs, the same way the Tollans had copied the designs of whatever we’ve found in the old outpost.” Her aid replied.

Travell pursed her lips grimly before getting up from her seat. “Call for a meeting of the Curia, we will need to discuss this discovery. Inform the Curia that we are going to discuss the Saritian’s pleads for technological aid as well, instead of waiting for the seventh day. It’s best to get all the important matters discussed and squared away at the same time.”

OoooO

Six hours ago, on the Planet Aschen Prime …

With a clinical calmness that all Aschen possessed, Mollen, part of the administration bureau of the Aschen Confederation, looked over the data gathered by the Aschen space fleet, in regards to mysterious ship that had appeared in orbit over Aschen Prime over two hours ago.

The ship had possessed some form of energy shield that protected it, after continuous bombardment of fusion bombs by the sixty-three ships of the Aschen space fleet which had surrounded it, it still remained unharmed. Demands of recall for twenty three other ships on border patrol had been made before the mysterious ship had suddenly vanished into a strange form of faster than light travel.

Unfretted by the disappearance of the unknown ship, the Administration had ordered a detailed data gathering of the unknown enemy. That was the reason why Mollen was currently pouring over a large chunk of scanned data taken of the ship.

It was also the reason why powerful bio-chemical weapons were now being produced to prepare for the day when they would manage to discover who this new race with the powerful starship belonged to. For Mollen was certain that while the Aschen might lack in starship technologies, the Aschen had already brought their bio-chemical engineering to a level few races could contest. After all, the many worlds and civilizations that were assimilated into the Aschen Confederation could attest that fact very well…

OoooO

Present time, within Accendia …

Their third day onboard Accendia and Cordelia was beginning to be used to life onboard the technologically advanced space station out in the vacuum of space. The environment was drastically different from the small town feel of Sunnydale, nor was Accendia as stifling as her mansion. For a moment Cordelia thought of her parents and her lips twisted.

Her father was most probably still on his business trips around the world, not to mention sleeping with his secretary of the moment. Her mother was probably now back at the mansion drowning her sorrows in liquor. It was doubtful her father even knew she would not be returning home for the current month. All her mother knew was that Cordelia was going on a month long journey with friends, not that the woman actually cared one shred about what Cordelia did.

At least here on Accendia, she had a purpose, a feeling that she was working towards a goal greater than herself. Not to mention having access to powerful technologies and magic was a huge ego boost. According to Tain, Accendia now had a population of 254, including the Order members as well as Xander’s small group, with humans only making up a quarter of the number. Everyone had been assigned different roles in the station, though the majority would be working on integrating Accendia and her ships with the few but powerful Lantean technologies that the group possessed.

When Xander had revealed his plans for the next one month, Buffy was the only one that elected to join the exploration teams which Xander would be forming. The rest in the group had decided that they rather liked Accendia, and would much prefer to spend their time on the space station, exploring and enhancing it.

Since they were allowed to pick and choose what they wish to do on Accendia, Cordelia decided to assist in the task of running DNA scans on everyone’s genetic makeup, and drawing genetic samples, together with Tain and Accendia’s current team of 13 “medical” staff. Xander had wanted to find out if there were any specific genetic markers that allow his followers to utilize their many different brands of magic. By afternoon, Cordelia had conducted scans of at least one member from each of the different species living in Accendia.

The wide variety and characteristics of Xander’s numerous followers had left Cordelia’s head spinning. The brash and hot tempered mannerism of the Mountain Kings took some getting used to, especially when Cordelia made the mistake of calling one of the Mountain King a he… when she was actually of the fairer sex. But how was Cordelia to know that the short bulky being was a female when she had a beard covering her whole face and a thick chain mail covering her chest? Then there had been that one Troll Shadow Hunter who had told Cordelia that she smells nice and delicious while drooling on the floor. That had been enough for her to make a grab for the biggest needle on the medical tray while inching for the emergency panic button under her table.

Of course there was also the tricky matter of drawing blood out of some of Xander’s followers. Some of their skins were just too tough for the Alteran equipment on board. Tain and several others had to create customized tools just to extract blood from those thick skinned followers.

All in all though, Cordelia had a great time with the members of Accendia’s medical team. Tain even smiled at her a few times throughout the day. Perhaps her patience was finally bearing fruit with the handsome Paladin. The morning crowd had disappeared and there were no more appointments until after lunch, so in the office she had taken as her own, within Accendia’s large medical center, Cordelia allowed herself to sink into a few minutes of delicious daydreams.

“Cordelia?” A high pitched voice and a knock on her door broke her concentration. Cordelia’s eyes snapped open and she saw the green haired Anna Latherman, a busty Sorceress assigned to the medical team. Cordelia and Anna had hit on straight away when they first met in the morning. The Sorceress had a love for modern Earth fashion, was well dressed and conscious of her appearance, almost like a reflection of Cordelia’s own character.

“What’s it with Sorceresses and their chest size?” Cordelia asked with a sigh, rolling her eyes.

“Why jealous gal?” Anna leered as she heaved her cleavage. “And just so you know, not all Sorceresses are you know… girls. Lord X’s ability to create followers apparently allows them to be of different sexes, even though the in game titles for the different units might mean otherwise. There’s those handful of guy Sorcerers who were created from the Sorceress class pool. I heard they’re real pretty boys, they’re great hits with each other.”

“Argh… too much info. And I am so not jealous of you.” Cordelia scoffed as she got off her seat and walked towards her new friend. “I’d probably get back pain from carrying those two monsters around. What are you here for? It can’t be to compare bust sizes.”

“Want to have an early lunch?” Anna asked twirling her finger around her hair. “I’ve checked the schedule, things will only pick up after 2pm. We can have ourselves a three hour break. I am thinking exotic Night Elf cuisine and trying new clothes, new shoes from the replicator.”

“Sounds like a great way to pass time.” Cordelia said with a grin, following Anna out of her office. She paused as the Sorceress’ words hit her. “Night Elf cuisine? Do we actually have those?”

“The Night Elves onboard Accendia inputted several clan dishes into Accendia’s replicator database last night, so did a lot of the other clans.” Anna said with a careless shrug. “We can try out some Pandaren ale as well, I heard that some of the Pandaren Brewmasters brought ale they had fermented straight from Earth. Pandaren ale is supposed to be top class.”

“I don’t think we’re supposed to drink if we’re going to be poking needles into other people later in the day.” Cordelia said with a snort. “But the Night elf cuisine sounds interesting. What do you recommend?”

“Well there’s the Valden herb pot, the Musalido wrapped chicken…”

OoooO

Present time, Australia…

Selma was a divorce of thirty years old, struggling to bring up her seven year old boy. Her husband had left her for a much younger and beautiful woman, and she had spent the past two years trying to make ends meet, doing two jobs six days a week. Now… now this had to happen…

Biting back a sob, she sat in the children’s ward which had six beds, five of which contained children with various injuries. Physically, her once bubbly and cheerful Tommy was unharmed, but his face remained twisted in pain even as powerful drugs pulled him to sleep.

The whole thing had happened more than one month ago. Tommy had apparently collapsed in school, wrecked with pain. He had been rushed off to the hospital, but the doctors had found nothing wrong with him. They had no idea what caused her boy to suffer, and in the end had to drug him to sleep and put him on drip. The only conclusion they managed to reach was that he was suffering from some nerve disease, and more tests had to be conducted to identify just what it was.

And as the weeks went passed, hope for helping her child dwindled. The doctors were at a lost and Selma could only sit beside her child and watch him suffer in silent agony. All that the doctors had said was that Tommy was not the only person suffering similar symptoms. Multiple similar cases had been reported worldwide and no one in the medical world quite knows what was going on.

A large percentage of those with identical conditions had apparently mysteriously recovered over the past few weeks. It had been the doctors’ hope that Tommy would soon similarly recover.

A shadow fell over her and Selma looked up in surprise, she had been so lost in thoughts that she had not sensed anyone walking up to Tommy’s bed.

“Ms. Whitemore?” A well-dressed brown haired man asked as he looked down at her with sympathetic blue eyes.

“Yes?” Selma asked as she quickly got up, her right hand still clutching her child’s unresponsive fist.

“I am Hermes Mathril. A representative of the Theramore Academy.” The man said bowing to her politely, startling Selma with his behaviour. “I have a cure for your child’s condition.”

“A cure?” Selma asked, her breath hitched. “What do you mean a cure? The doctors have tried everything!”

The man, Hermes, took out an ornate glass bottle that contains clear sparkly liquid of some sort. “The doctors here can’t cure what your child is suffering from. Do you mind stepping to the balcony so we might have a more private conversation?”

Mystified, but clutching at the hope that her Tommy might have a cure at last, Selma followed the man across the ward, stepping out to the connecting balcony as the man closed the door behind them. At this hour of the day, the balcony was empty. As she looked expectantly at the man who had brought her here, Selma was unprepared for his next words.

“Tell me Ms. Whitemore, what do you know about magic?” Hermes asked even as he waved his hand and a humanoid figure made of water appeared beside them…

OoooO

Present time, Accendia …

Buffy adjusted her equipment and her haversack, making sure everything was in place as she turned to her team members. She was part of E-team 1, short for exploration team 1. Ian was in her group, there was also Matthew Scott, once a normal human of Earth, before he was caught up in a deconstruction during Xander’s battle with Glory. Now Matthew was a hero unit, and though Buffy had seen him a few times, she never did have a chance to talk to him. Matthew was also the designated leader of E-team 1.

Aside from Matthew and Ian, there were thirty other members in the team, of which, five were hero units, while the rest were normal units. Each of the exploration teams were assigned a capital starship for their usage, as such, a large team was needed to fulfil multiple roles onboard the ship. Engineering, navigation, security, science, medical, logistics and command were each headed by the seven hero units in the team. Buffy was the pilot for E-Team 1’s capital ship, and was under the command of Lareon, the group’s handsome and slim High Elf Blood Mage, who heads the Navigation department.

Matthew heads Central Command, Ian heads the Science departments, Darkón, a big hulking half night elf, half stag creature that was a Keeper of the Grove, heads the Security department while moonlighting as a scientist specialising in plant and animal sciences. Erika, a charming brown haired Paladin, heads the Medical department, Oa’renk, an Orc Farseer oversees the Logistics department, while Winakélon, a Naga Sea Witch, heads the group’s Engineering department.

The whole group was currently gathered at the western edge of Accendia’s central commerce area, where an Alteran artifact loosely translated as the Gateway device, would transport them through a similar device within the capital ship E-Team 1 was assigned to. Crates of supplies had been gathered next to the group, to be brought onto the ship. Unlike Accendia, none of the Alteran starships possessed Alteran replicator devices. The devices apparently utilize a great amount of power which caused them to be ill suited for starship installations.

E-Team 1’s first assignment was a First Contact mission. Xander had already located two human civilizations on other planets. One of them had seemed to be a peaceful society, and E-Team 1 was supposed to make formal contact with them, and find out what this civilization knows about the galactic state of affairs.

The Gateway device was a large gold rimmed circular artifact. The device sat at the top of a raised platform, and at the bottom of the platform was a small dais half the size of a grown man, etched with various symbols. The general Alteran knowledge that Buffy possessed, gave her a general description of how the dais works. Basically the Gateway together with the dais were connected to each other. Each Gateway device was internally labelled with certain symbols, and by pressing the symbols on the dais, different Gateway devices could establish wormhole connections with each other. In short, they operated closely similar to Earth’s telephones.

Matthew was the one that dialled the symbols on the dais, connecting Accendia’s Gateway to the Gateway on E-Team 1’s capital ship. Buffy watched as the Gateway device began turning with each input of the symbols, at the seventh symbol, a pool of silvery liquid energy formed across the Gateway device with a loud whooshing sound. Everyone stepped back a safe distance as the silvery energy rushed out of the device, before stabilising into a gleaming pool of energy over the Gateway device.

“Alright everyone, let’s move out.” Matthew called out as the thirty-three man team began lining up in line, moving up onto the raised platform and stepping through the silvery liquid wormhole. Behind the group, Oa’renk began barking out orders to his men mainly made up of Orcs and Trolls to bring the supply crates through.

Buffy held her breath as she stepped through. Colours whirled passed her and Buffy felt like she just stumbled into a swirling rollercoaster ride, before the wormhole spit her out into a large room which was lit with bright orange lights. She quickly moved out of the way as more members of E-Team 1 stepped through. Having a lot of Alteran’s piloting and transport knowledge in her head, she was able to instantly pull up the schematics of the capital class ship E-Team 1 was assigned to.

The large room that everyone had entered was the Gateway room onboard a capital class Alteran starship. It was on the third level of the capital ship which had seven levels in total. The command tower of the starship was accessible at the other end of the ship, giving whoever was inside the tower a clear view of the starship’s forefront from its position close to the ship’s rear. In a battle situation, the command tower would retract into the body of the starship, to be protected by its strong ship hull in case of shield failure.

It took several minutes before everyone in E-Team 1 was onboard the starship, together with the ship’s supplies. Matthew walked to the center of the room before nodding at everyone, beginning to call out his instructions.

“Alright, I need everyone to help ferry the supplies into the ship’s storage.” Matthew said in a firm voice. “The faster we get it done, the faster we can go book in each of our rooms while onboard this ship. The mission will commerce in two hours’ time, so after the supplies have been safely stored away and all of you have settled down, I need the whole team to go over the ship to familiarize yourself with them. Understand?”

Buffy opened her mouth to reply in affirmative, but was drowned out by the louder cries of the Orcs and Trolls.

“They’re pretty rowdy aren’t they?” An amused voice said beside her. Turning around, Buffy saw a blond haired petite girl standing next to her. She was dressed in modern clothes, jeans and t-shirt, making it difficult for Buffy to determine what human class she belonged to. None of the exploration teams have uniforms yet, though from what Xander had told her, the designs of the uniforms for each department were in process.

“I am Wren, I am a Knight, part of the security department.” The blond haired girl introduced, smiling at Buffy. “You’re Buffy Summers right? Lord Xander’s companion.”

“Nice to meet you.” Buffy said shaking hands with the girl who had a surprisingly strong grasp. Buffy could feel the worm callus on the girl’s hands, most probably from wielding the broadswords that the Knight class tend to carry. “I guess everyone already knows who I am around here.”

“That’s a given.” Wren said with a wink as Matthew finished his orders and everyone began moving towards the supply crates and began carrying them to the storage area. Wren easily carried a large crate in her hands, while Buffy followed suite. “Lord Xander pretty much passed everyone he created the faces of his families at the very first opportunities. We’re all instructed to look out for you.”

“He what?” Buffy said, startled at this piece of news. While she had been aware that all of Xander’s followers seemed to instantly know who she and her family were, she had no idea Xander had taken it that far with his sense of protectiveness.

“He was just looking out for all of you.” Wren said, apparently sensing that Buffy was unhappy about what Xander had done. “There are a number of demon clans who had sworn blood feud against Xander and anyone close to him back on Earth. Of course, most of them are already annihilated, but some of them are still in hiding and I am sure Lord Xander is making sure all of you will be safe.”

“Back on Earth…” Buffy trailed off, turning to look at Wren with interest. “You were one of the first groups to be created?”

“Yeah, I was part of the team protecting Asia from demon threats during the past one month past.” Wren said with a shudder. “I’ve died so many times on the battlefield that I’m more or less numb to it already. Some of the ancient demon clans in Indonesia weren’t easy to deal with.”

“Oh.” Buffy’s eyes lighted up. “You’ve got to tell me all about it. Xander never told me what he did for the past one month plus…”

OoooO

Two hours later …

Stepping through the Gateway device with Yalen beside him, Xander was swept up by the exhilarating energies of the wormhole, before being deposited in the Gateway room of the capital ship that was in stationary orbit over the skeleton ruins of an old Alteran outpost.

The capital ship was one of the three capital ships originally sent out which had found traces of Alteran ruins in deep space. E-Team 3 had been assigned to the ship and in the past two hours, had set up a command post onboard. Since the Alteran ruin the ship was orbiting was hidden in a solar system made up of a large Sun, which was four times the size of Earth’s Sun and burns a hundred times more powerfully, the two planets in the vicinity were pretty much made up of just molten rocks, and there was no signs of any civilizations in a perimeter of several light years from them.

From Lauger Amben’s compendium, with data supplemented from Accendia’s database, the Alteran ruin found at the very edge of this small solar system was actually an old Alteran research outpost that had been observing and conducting experiments on the Sun itself. They were doing kind of Alteran Stellar Manipulation research that was eventually scrapped when the Alterans fled the Milky Way galaxy during the great plague. Right now, Xander would be here to rebuild the outpost back to its Prime Condition.

The leader of E-Team 3, Uo-er, a Pandaren Brewmaster, and his second in command, the Paladin Nerim, was waiting in the Gateway room when Xander and Yalen arrived. Uo-er sketched a quick bow, bending his giant fluffy panda body, while Nerim gave Xander a salute.

“Lord Xander.” The deep gruff voice of Uo-er said in greeting. “Welcome onboard the ship. We’ve just finish stowing away the supplies and conducting preliminary scans of the area.”

“Good job Uo-er.” Xander said with a nod. “Once I’ve repaired and reconstruct the old Alteran research outpost, I’ll be sending E-Team 7 through the Gateway to man the structure. E-Team 3 will continue to provide protection for them within the immediate vicinity.”

“Understood my Lord.” Uo-er said seriously.

Inwardly Xander sighed to himself. No matter how many times he told his followers not to give him the title of Lord, most of them still do it. It had gotten to the point where Xander just left the title as it is, since he was obviously fighting a losing battle in that regards.

“Alright, let’s move on to the viewing deck, so Yalen can get a clear view of the structure.” Xander said as the four of them began moving out of the Gateway room, towards one of the viewing decks onboard the starship. “We’ll be down there for a while once we teleport down.”

They walked past several rooms which had been occupied by the different members of E-Team 3. This was also the first time that Xander had first-hand experience walking in one of the Alteran capital ship. Picking out the image of the capital ship’s interior from his followers’ minds and walking within it on his own were two different things.

There were moments in the recent months were Xander just felt suffocated by the numbers of his followers under him. These days instead of facing danger and adventure head on, his followers were the ones that did most of that, and he himself was forced into a command and support role, observing from the backseat because he was just too important to risk himself. He literally had the lives of thousands of his followers in his hands. There was no telling what would happen to them if he were to ever die.

Deep in thoughts, Xander reached the viewing deck in short order. The clear window view of the viewing deck showed the metallic ruins of the Alteran outpost below them. The group spent a few moments in silence as Yalen took a good look at it. Though Xander could have plucked the image of the outpost from any members of E-Team 3 that had seen it while onboard, there were often times where it was better for the Archmage that was doing the teleportation to take his own good look at the location. It somehow increased the accuracy of the teleport, though none of the Archmages could currently provide a clear explanation of why that was the case.

“I’ve got the target.” Yalen said with a nod. He began taking out the Lantean forcefield and air purifier devices from his pockets, attaching the green and yellow jewelled devices on his chest. Xander followed suit, tensing a little as he linked hands with Yalen. There was the familiar sensation of everything around him blurring as the teleport took hold, and then he was in the darkness of space, a suffocating silence, standing on top a piece of metallic beam protruding out of the ruins of the outpost.

Xander took a deep breath to calm himself as he realised that he was not going to be assaulted by the rush of uncontrollable visions. Even now, he still had no idea why he would receive visions from some structures, while others would not affect him. Unlinking hands, Yalen stood back, protected by his own forcefield bubble while he let Xander work. Bending down, with his own forcefield bubble acting as a layer between his hands and the blistering cold metal, Xander hammered down, releasing his own powers of Repair into the structure.

OoooO

One hour later, on the Planet Tollan …

Omoc’s eyes observed the Curia intensely as the gathered council members came to a decision in regards to what they should do about the mysterious ship that had appeared over their home planet. Since the Curia had been assembled close to an hour ago, the topic had been fiercely debated, and Omoc was pretty sure of the conclusion that had been reached.

“… As per the majority votes of the Curia, we will begin assembling defensive contingencies until we know more about the mysterious race that had sent the powerful starship to orbit Tollan.” Head councilwoman Travell announced from the podium. “Our scientists will begin trying to track the starship back to its origins. According to new information discovered, whatever form of faster than light technology that the starship uses, leave severe hyperspace turbulence that would linger on in space for an estimate of five days. The scientists had noted that our scanners can be calibrated to track the trail of hyperspace turbulence back to its source.”

The Curia
began muttering in the background as council woman Travell continued. “Now onto the next matter that needed the attention of the Curia, we will need to come to a conclusion in regards to the technology exchange with the Saritans. The Lordalor Republic and Mellizen Empire of our neighbouring Sarita had agreed to mine various metallic resources for us in exchange for our energy generation technologies. I will need the gathered Curia to make a decision as to whether to go ahead with the proposal…”

Travell was cut off as the doors to the Curia Assembly chambers slammed opened. The aide to High council Travell rushed in, a frantic look on her face.

“Council woman Travell!” The aide cried out, her voice travelling loudly in the shocked silence of the enclosed chambers. “The mysterious ship had reappeared in orbit above us. A holographic signal is being projected from it, they are attempting to contact us!”

Omoc stiffened as the council erupted into voices of chaos. “Silence! Silence.” Travell called out as she tried to maintain order in the assembly. Quickly the council woman began inputting commands into her podium. “We shall see what this mysterious race has to say…”

In the center of the assembly hall, a holographic projection began to light up, showing what seemed to be the interior command structure of a ship. There were several stations in the command deck, and it was those that man those stations, that shocked the gathered Curia into silence.

There were obviously humans onboard of whatever the ship was, but there were also other aliens… beings the Tollan had never seen or encountered before. There was a large green skinned menacing looking long armed alien standing at the corner of the screen. There were two blue skinned creatures that had the frontal body of a human with serpentine lower halves. There were even purple skinned humanoids with sharp tipped ears and golden and purple eyes.

A young human male seated in the center of the screen was speaking, but whatever language he was using was unknown. The translation program probably needed more time to work.

“asdlk… wejksjd… people of Azerothians. We are a race of explorers and we come in peace. If you are able to understand us, please accept our First Contact data package.” The man said, his words becoming comprehensible as the translation program got through. The holographic projection seemingly froze, before the scene jerked a little. The man took a deep breath as he began to repeat what he just said. “We are the people of Azerothians. We are a race of explorers and we come in peace. If you are able to understand us, please accept our First Contact data package.”

Travell froze the projection as the scene repeated itself again. She began typing fiercely into her podium. Whatever she saw on the interface caused her eyes to widen. In the shocked silence of the Curia, she looked up, a tensed look in her eyes.

“Gathered members of the Curia, it appeared that a new civilization made up of several different races had made contact with us. A powerful civilization the Tollans had never encountered before.” Travell said intensely. “They had sent us a data packet with pictures of their civilization and basic languages package. I will need the Curia to go through of all this information and advice on a course of action within the next hour!”

OoooO

Outskirts of Los Angeles, Within the Southern California Sanctuary, Theramore Academy

Two miles at the outskirt of the city, with the sun setting in the horizon, Angel drove his car off the highway leading out of Los Angeles, towards Sunnydale. His car rolled down the newly constructed side road leading out of the highway, speeding steadily inwards through half a mile of desert before a high wall stretching into the distance came into view.

The road Angel was driving down leads directly into the only entrance of the walled compound. A small billboard with the words ‘Welcome to the Southern California Sanctuary’ blinked at the entrance arch in flashing retro neon colours. As Angel neared the entrance, he could literally sense a heavy wall of magic sweeping over him. His senses were still tingling as he drove through the entrance, into what was literally a large town.

Newly constructed buildings lined the streets in neat rows. There were people of all races and species roaming the streets, chilling in bars or cafes, or just simply staying at home. Demons and members of the Order were able to walk in the streets without fear of exposure. The powerful magic protecting the boundaries of the compound ensured that no one with ill intentions or had no idea of the supernatural could enter the place.

The Southern California Sanctuary was an idea born from one incredible young man, who wanted to create hidden enclaves where the Alliance and the Order could live and gather in harmony. Officially the Southern California Sanctuary was a sanctioned town in the country which was only a month old. Unofficially, it was the first magical and supernatural enclave to be built in the states.

Before Xander had left for space, he had made painstaking efforts to absorb the branches of Wolfram and Hart all over the world, not just the main branch in Los Angeles. With a legion of powerful ex-evil lawyers under the Order and a limitless cash flow, seven plots of lands and applications for township sanctions had been bought and completed worldwide.

The Order and Alliance were now working hand in hand to make sure the subsequent six enclaves in China, Canada, Taiwan, England, Russia and Africa would prove to be successes. As it was, the populace of the Southern California Sanctuary were growing larger day by day. It was a common sight to see the Order’s wisps constructing additional buildings and structures at the edges of the town and rebuilding the magical walls.

From what Angel understands, Jestina had been instructed by Xander to gather a number of powerful magic users from Earth together two weeks before he left Earth. They were supposed to cast blessings and powerful magic of protections and deterrence onto a wall built with powerful metal interior and outer stone casings. Once that had been done and everyone had left, Xander had arrived to deconstruct the structure. The blueprints of those structures were then passed to the wisps which were able to construct those powerful walls around the Southern California Sanctuary to protect itself and its denizens.

The Southern California Sanctuary had a Mountain King acting as its Mayor and Angel would drop by from time to time just to check on it. But Angel was not in town today just for an inspection, he had another focus this evening.

Driving deeper into the town, he reached the center of the town in minutes. Parking his car at the sidewalk, he got out and eyed the majesty building before him.

“Lovely isn’t she?” A voice tingling with pride said. Angel turned around to see an Order member that he instantly recognized from previous dealings.

“Hermes.” Angel said with a nod, smiling at the Archmage. “Nice of you to meet me at the entrance, I was just going to go in.”

“Of course, be my guest.” Hermes said leading the way into the building’s compound, walking up a spread of beautiful gardens leading to the entrance. A signboard proclaimed proudly that the building was ‘Theramore Academy – Center of Magic, Learning and Administration’. “I was just taking a break from all the planning. When I receive your call for the meeting, I thought I’ll come out to meet you.”

“I appreciate that Headmaster.” Angel said with a smile. “It’s just a routine check of the Academy, after all, it will be open in a week’s time and everyone in the Order and Alliance are excited. It’s the first time the idea of a joint center of magical learning was ever proposed on Earth. Not to mention I need an update from the various magical departmental heads. This evening is the only free time I have this week.”

“Of course. Maybe just to give you a heads up, a number of the families who had accepted invitations to the Academy had already moved into town. The Magicals Relocation Department are integrating them into our society by finding them jobs and things to do while the younger ones, whether they are magicals or not, will attend Academy lessons.” Hermes remarked as they walked into the compound. “My staff had already draft out most of the curriculum. We’re ready to teach General Earth Sciences from Grade 1 all the way to university level, as well as incorporating the different fields of magic.”

“That’s good. What about the location of magicals around the world who needed our help?” Angel asked. Currently, Hermes as the Headmaster of the Theramore Academy, was actually serving a dual role as the Head Administrator of Magic within the Alliance. The man would have to handle more than just the Academy once it was opened, but also the various magical departments that were set up to deal with Earth’s magic users.

“We’ve located 8,756 Magicals who are not aware of their magical potential and needed help within the past month. According to the spell casters of the Alliance, there remained 4,123 Magicals around the world who needed assistance. I am working closely with the Department of Magical Aids to round up the rest.” Hermes said with a wearily sigh. “But it is hard work, a lot of those remaining are in military hospitals, or some obscure locations, not easy places to enter and exit.”

“Give me the list of those remaining.” Angel said with a nod. “I’ll see if anyone in the Alliance or Wolfram and Hart has the connections to smooth things out with those in secure locations.”

“I’ll get the list ready first thing in the morning.” Hermes promised. The two men transverse the interior of the Academy before entering a meeting room which was already filled with numerous people.

Everyone got up as Hermes and Angel entered. Giving a smile, Angel took a seat at the tip of the table, nodding as everyone sat down. “Good evening everyone. Let’s begin our weekly Magical Administrative meeting…”

Arm Commander, Alexander Chapter Two

Note: This piece was written quite a while back and is still not beta sorry for the grammar or spelling mistakes. I’ll go through them when I have time.

Story Title: Arm Commander, Alexander

Summary: Wearing an armor suit for Halloween night left Xander with some unexpected results. Sunnydale was destroyed… and the truth is out. Crossovers: BtVS/ SG-1/ Star Trek Voyager/ Harry Potter / Master of Orion II

Author: Wraithrune

Disclaimer: This is a work of fanfiction and no profit is made. Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Stargate SG-1, Star Trek Voyager, Harry Potter and Master of Orion II all belongs to their respective owners. This is my way of keeping my favorite shows, book and game alive through fanfiction. And without further a dos, enjoy the story…

Chapter Two: The Aftermath

Three and a half hours ago, Arm HQ situated at the edge of sink hole Sunnydale

It was pure chaos. The opening of the Hellmouth. The sinking of Sunnydale. One second Giles was running for his life, the next he had appeared at the outer limits of Sunnydale with hundreds of others, watching in shock as the town sank. Flying ships resembling those Star Trek starships had appeared, depositing more people. And as the town sank, a large metal machine of some sort had appeared. The machine had aimed its large hands at the empty space a distance away and had built a large shelter which he had then herded the confused and frightened citizens of Sunnydale into. There they had found long corridors leading to large furnished rooms with all the basic necessities. People were talking of UFOs and alien abduction in frightened whispers, many had refused to step into the created shelter, fleeing down the highway leading to L.A.

Surprisingly the giant machine had proceeded to ignore the fleeing citizens and began to build a large compound of some sort a distance away. Giles had managed to locate Buffy, though they were unable to find Xander and Willow in the panicked crowd. The group of refugees had only managed to trek half way across Sunnydale and L.A. when tanks and army vehicles blocked their path. It had been shocking to Giles how quickly the newly arrived military had cordoned off the road to L.A., preventing the refugees from advancing further. They were forced to make camp at the side of the highway under military guard while a large portion of the military personals had proceeded back in the direction of Sunnydale.

Giles and Buffy had tried searching the crowd for anyone they knew when a tingling sensation and motes of lights appeared around them. Seconds later, they had disappeared from the shocked crowd of refugees who backed away in horror.

OoooO

Three and a half hours ago, Arm HQ situated at the edge of sink hole Sunnydale

If someone had told Willow that sometime in the future she would be huddling together with Cordelia in what looked like a containment camp out of World War II, she would have called them nuts. That did not make it less real now, as Willow and Cordelia clutched to each other in fear, lost amidst the crowd of hundreds of frightened and displaced people. They had tried to find other familiar faces, but among so many people, even moving was difficult, Willow had been lucky that Cordelia was right beside her when she had appeared mysteriously near the edge of Sunnydale, together with many others as Sunnydale began to collapse.

Right at the moment, the two shared a blanket between them. Night has already fallen and the air was chilly, they had been lucky to even get a blanket from one of the soldier who was passing a stack of them around.

“I can’t sleep.” Cordelia said in a strained voice. Her face looked pale under the moon light.

“I know the feeling. We just watch our homes sinking into a large crater, then there are the flying spaceships and giant robot saving us.” Willow said shivering as she remembered the events. “I think we are justified at not being able to sleep. I just wish we can find Buffy and X…”

Willow’s words were cut off as motes of lights appeared around Cordelia and her. There was a stomach lurching sensation and then… they reappeared in a brightly light room with richly carpeted floor. Cordelia and Willow screeched in fear, jumping off their butts, clutching at each other and looked wildly around them.

“Willow!” A familiar voice cried out. And suddenly Willow found herself stumbling back as Buffy mysteriously appeared by her side, trying to hug her to death.

“Buffy… *cough*… slayer strength…” Willow choked. Buffy’s eyes widened in embarrassment as she quickly let go of Willow.

“What happened?” Cordelia asked in a shrill frightened voice, eyes darting wildly at the large furnished room which seemed to be a meeting room of some sort. There was a long table, surrounded by ten chairs, and a screen of some sort was hovering at the center of the table. “Did the aliens bring us here?”

It was then Willow realized that Giles was standing behind Buffy, looking around the room grimly. The older man seemed about to make a move to calm down a near hysterical Cordelia when the only door to the room at a corner of the wall, slide open, revealing a tall muscular man. His skin was a smooth bronze, with a hair of gleaming blond hair. He would be very handsome if not for the lecherous look on his face, his chilling alien silver eyes and a blinking antenna of some sort that seemed to be embedded into the left side of his head.

“Actually I brought you here to ravish you!” The man cried out as he lunged for Cordelia.

Cordelia gave a shrill scream, scrambling backwards in fear. Buffy rushed forward in an offensive stance while the man paused looking abashed.

“I was kidding Cordelia.” The man said rolling his eyes. “I couldn’t help it when I saw the look on your face. Anyway I didn’t mean to scare you that much.”

“Who are you?” Giles asked, his voice sharp as he moved to stand beside Buffy, sheltering Willow and a shuddering Cordelia from the strange and most possibly alien man.

“What G-man? You can’t recognize me?” The man asked with a grin. His tone was familiar, phrased in a friendly way. It took Willow a second to realize what had happened. Her rational mind was screaming that her suspicions were impossible, but her heart told her otherwise.

Before Giles or Buffy could stop her, Willow rushed forward, standing in front of the huge man who towered over her by half a height, who probably had triple her mass or more.

“Kindergarten.” Willow said, her eyes wide as she stared at the man who just gave her a friendly and very familiar goofy grin.

“Er… You’re talking about the time I steal your Barbie, the yellow crayon incident, or the Cordelia hate club?” The man asked as he gave a little frown. “Wait… the hate club is much later…”

“Xander?” Willow gasped in shock, her suspicions confirmed even as she heard similar shocked exclamations from behind her. “What happened to you? What is going on?”

“Yup the X-man in the flesh.” The man, Xander said. “Or should I say new flesh. I don’t know what really happened. All I know was that I was bringing my kids trick or treating. The next thing I know, my costume turned real, I woke up in a 60 feet tall Arm Commander unit, my body was changed, Sunnydale was collapsing and I was trying to save everyone. According to the last scans done by my starships, there are no recently dead human bodies in the now Sunnydale crater, which means I managed to save everyone in town. Unfortunately, a lot of cats, dogs and demons are now dead.”

“But this is impossible…” Giles said in disbelief as he looked at the strange man who was apparently Xander.

“Giles, Sunnydale is home to the Hellmouth, I have since learnt that nothing is impossible.” Xander said dryly. “And I brought you guys here to figure what in the world is going on. Cordelia… well she’s more of a tag along when I realized she was beside Willow from my scans of the area.”

“You don’t understand Xander.” Giles said agitatedly. “Whatever happened to you caused the Hellmouth to open. The energies of Sunnydale’s Hellmouth are most probably drained. The Hellmouth most probably no longer exists, its destruction is probably the catalyst that caused Sunnydale to collapse into a crater.”

“Oh…” Xander said looking stunned. “I did wonder what kind of magic was powerful enough to make my costume and everything in its database turned real. The energy requirements alone would be astonishing. But if the Hellmouth was powering the change… it explained everything.”

“Oh I am sure it does.” A sweet voice, tingling with hints of barely suppressed anger said as Cordelia stalked forward, her eyes blazing hot enough to burn Xander on the spot. “But you have another problem right now.” Cordelia snarled her fist clenched tight as she glared at the man who had frightened the life out of her. “Alexander Lavelle Harris… you are so DEAD!”

OoooO

Three hours ago, Arm HQ situated at the edge of sink hole Sunnydale

Caitlyn Horsun, also known to the Arm population as Lady Hawk, was one of the foremost ace pilots of her faction. In particular, she was highly skilled in operating the Hawk, a powerful Stealth Fighter unit. She had been cloned thousands of times, ever since her skills were recognized one thousand and five years into the long four thousand years against the Core.

The memories of each of her cloned selves would be merged into the central data bank upon their death. As per Arm cloning protocols, only Caitlyn’s original memories of her first sixty years were kept intact, the life memories of her numerous clones were wiped clean. The only things that were retained from the memories of the clones were of the skill sets which they had gained. All these skills and experience would then be incorporated into the clone template of Caitlyn Horsun. Thus all new Caitlyn(s) began life anew, starting from their prime at age sixty, with incredible skillsets and abilities.

As per all Arm citizens’ clone templates, Caitlyn was conditioned to be obedient to the orders of the Arm Council and the Arm Commanders who led the battlefields. It had been a natural state of affairs in her faction, especially during the four thousand years war against the Core who was more superiorly powerful and efficient in many ways.

Thus when she stepped out of her cloning vat after she had awakened, the first thing she had done was to connect the neural interface next to the vat into her neural implant at the base of her head. Critical information flowed into her, revealing to her which Arm Council members and Arm Commander was in charge of her new body.

Caitlyn blinked as the data revealed key irregularities to her. She was assigned to no Arm Council members, though the Arm Commander in charge of her was Theodore Denól, a relatively young Arm Commander who had managed to attain the position of an Arm Commander with his powerful tactical skills and fast neural transfer capacity. Known to the Core as the Silver Seer, Theodore Denól was critical in allowing the Arm faction to regain control of the planets Amestril, Laborn, Mesroad, Resil and Oonara.

Commander Theodore had also flagged an Orange alert with Green status, which was Arm code for Dangerous Space Anomaly detected, Threat Level moderate. It was such a contradictory info flag that Caitlyn had blinked in surprise. The base’s crew members also numbered at twenty, including the Commander himself. The numbers were so ridiculously low that it falls below Arm safety protocols even in times of peace. An Arm base at the minimal was always staffed by a crew of at least five hundred Arm citizens. If the Core was to launch a surprise attack, twelve men and women would not be enough to counter even a squad of Core A.K., since a basic squad would have at least fifty units.

The last data speak of a need for urgent meeting with the Commander himself, which was something that was virtually unheard of. Caitlyn had never heard of any Arm Commander personally meeting with his own crew member. Arm Commanders and Arm Council members were the highest order of Arm society, they were never meant to interact with the normal Arm citizens. They were the protectors and guardians of the Arm faction, and their orders were absolute.

Instructions by the Arm Commander were always passed through neural interfaces. Since all normal Arm citizens were conditioned to obey the commands of the higher class no matter how distasteful the orders were, there was virtually no need for a face to face meeting.

As the blueprint of the Arm base was downloaded into Caitlyn’s head with directions to the meeting room, her mind whirled in confusion at what she had learnt. The Arm base she was currently in was ridiculously small. It only had an anti-matter power plant, a cloning center, four laser defense towers, a command center, and a hangar.

The hangar housed the Arm Commander unit… and five starships, ships that according to data provided, actually travelled in the stars faster than the speed of light. Arm and Core spacecrafts could only handle slightly less than the speed of light at best, they were meant for interplanetary travel at best, though in ages passed, before humanity split into the Arm and Core factions, constructor ships were built to transverse the galaxy, to construct and deposit Galactic Gates on each planets in their path.

By the time of the Core and Arm split, there were Galactic Gates on almost all the planets in the galaxy. With the instantaneous travel provided by the Galactic Gates, there had been no need for the Core or Arm faction to actually research into building ships that transverse space at faster than light speed, especially not when both sides were entrenched in a long bloody war.

Caitlyn wondered how on earth the Commander actually got his hands on those ships. She very much doubted that they were created by Core or Arm as their design philosophy was so drastically different. As a pilot, the thought of flying NEW crafts that could go faster than light enflamed something within her, but the order of the Commander deterred that burning desire for the moment.

First she had to get some clothes. Then she had to find the crew who were cloned, and proceed together to see the Commander to find out what in the world was going on.

OoooO

Two and a half hours ago, Arm HQ situated at the edge of sink hole Sunnydale

Giles felt sick as Xander in his new transformed body, Willow, Buffy and Cordelia went through what actually happened during Halloween night. Apparently Willow and Buffy had experienced brief effects of possessions by their Halloween counterparts before they regained controlled seconds later, shortly before the Hellmouth opened. The memories were already fading quickly. In fact Buffy even had trouble remembering them, Willow surprisingly still retained the brief and full memory of her few seconds of time as a ghost. Cordelia however remained unaffected.

Things actually became clear when Giles discovered the name of the Halloween shop that Xander, Willow and Buffy had gotten their costumes from. When he had heard the name Ethan’s Halloween shop and gotten a verbal description of the shop owner from Xander, Willow and Buffy, Giles had known instantly who was the culprit for the destruction of Sunnydale and the transformation of Xander.

Ethan Rayne, an old acquaintance of his, who was also a relatively powerful magic user. That old fool must have tapped into the energies of the Hellmouth for his spell. Somehow, his magic must had gone awry, because the Hellmouth had been forced opened and its energies were used to make permanent changes to Xander and his costume. As to Ethan Rayne, Xander had spent half an hour scanning for him to no avail. Giles had little doubt that Ethan must have been physically destroyed by the unstable spell as what commonly happened when magic went wrong.

His actions however had grave consequences, even after his death, like now…

“What do you mean you’re going to tell the military that you’re an alien passing by and just happened to save everyone in Sunnydale?” Willow was gaping at Xander as the boy… no man, at least in the physical sense, told the group of his plans.

“I can hardly tell the military the truth.” Xander said patiently. “The military knows of the supernatural, it is evident in how closely they kept an eye on Sunnydale, though luckily from what I can tell through their networks, they didn’t catch any visuals of my costume turning real. What they do not know is that Sunnydale collapsed tonight, and what seemed to be aliens are here. Now think Willow, what happens if we tell the military, even let those outside the military know that there is a spell that can change fictional items real? The spell just needs to be powered by a Hellmouth, which might be drained dry, which might cause everything in its immediate area to collapse…”

“If this gets out, someone will replicate it.” Buffy said paling in horror. “And there might be no Xander with his powerful techno robot next time round to save everyone.”

“That’s correct.” Xander said, nodding at Buffy who had realized why he had spun up that cover story

“You’ve really changed.” Giles said eyeing Xander carefully. After hearing of the summarized version of who Xander had changed into, Giles knew that even though outwardly Xander’s character remained the same, the very core Xander’s essence had already been altered. It might even be possible that his psyche might already be damaged by the rogue spell Ethan had cast. “You’re thinking several steps ahead, of all possible consequences.”

Xander visibly hesitated. “Technically, I have more than 1,678 years of experience in warfare and tactical planning. I did tell you guys that.”

“And how deep are the changes?” Giles probe carefully. The changes experience by his previously goofy young charge would have world changing consequences. With the technologies at his disposal, Xander could very well alter the fate of the world with just his words. Giles had no idea what he should do right now after learning of the magical aftermath of Halloween night, one thing he did know was that he need to make sure Xander remain stable after the change.

“… well…” Xander seemed reluctant to continue. “Pretty deep I suppose. I am still me, it is just the memories of Theodore are pretty entrenched into my mind, his experience and skills just come naturally to me.”

“Those memories aren’t going to overcome you are they?” Willow asked looking frightened.

“No… I don’t think so.” Xander said with a thoughtful frown. “I can shut off Theodore’s memories if I really wanted to. It’s just after living so many lifetimes and thousands of years, the experiences and skills he had are incredible. I will have to be a fool not to tap on them.”

“Yes, but perhaps during times when there’s no need for you to access those memories, you could close them off like you said.” Giles spoke up. “We have no idea what prolonged connection to your Halloween self’s memories would do to you.”

“I could do that, but first I have to deal with the military problem outside my doorstep.” Xander said with a frown. “The Harry Potter verse database within my Commander unit actually has the energy variations of their various spells and magic. Some of the spells could hide locations and edit memories, the only problem is that I need to construct a suitable energy emitter to replicate those Harry Potter spells. That would take days or months even, so that means that particular database are useless for the moment.”

“Surely you aren’t going to modify someone’s memories just because you could?” Giles looked mildly horrified.

“Of course not. Giles you know me better than that!” Xander said with a sigh. “I am just exploring my options. The Master of Orion II has many powerful technologies, including cloaking and shield generators, I’ve actually been controlling my Commander unit to create some constructor bots which can create those items. Within half an hour, multiple layers of shield and cloak will surround the base. I seriously doubt anything in this world can damage the base after that, unless they can actually teleport in.”

“Some demons and magic users do have that capability.” Giles revealed. “But most importantly, everything you can create, even your own Commander unit, came from fictional media in our world. How are you even going to explain that to the military?”

“I am a highly advanced alien who took a liking to various Earth culture. In fact, I’ve created technologies based on the Star Trek Voyager shows and Total Annihilation game of Earth.” Xander said with a quirk of his lips.

“Total Annihilation?” Buffy asked at the name.

“That’s the game where the Arm Commander came from. I’ll been searching the internet for more details after I realized what really happened to me.” Xander answered, giving an uncomfortable shrug. “There’s not much information about the Arm and Core backstory which actually helps with my cover story. The list of Arm units in the game did match what I have.”

“So you’re hinging everything on the military believing you’re an alien that actually created working technologies based on Earth fiction.” Giles said as he gave Xander an incredulous look.

“Come on Giles, look at him.” Cordelia who had been sulking at the back of the group finally spoke up. The girl still seemed to be ruffled by the scare Xander had given her. “He’s taller than an average human being on Earth, his muscles looks like watermelons, he says he’s physically 50 years old and looks like 20, and let’s not mention the silver eyes. I mean alien much?”

“Theoretically I am still human.” Xander retorted, seemingly a little offended by Cordelia’s tactless feedback, even though he had been the one that started the whole topic. “Humanity in Theodore’s world just brought genetic alteration to a very high level. Physical genetic alterations were considered common, and the Immunity Serum administered to all newborns made them immune to a lot of diseases and virus in the galaxy, even lengthening cellular lifespans. To the Arm society, 50-60 years is the Prime of a normal human being. 80-100 is middle age, and for those that lived that far, their bodies started failing at around 150 years old. Though most Arm citizen chose to reclone themselves during their middle ages.”

“I call first dibs on the Immunity Serum.” Cordelia immediately said as her eyes brightened at the information.

“Hmph…” Xander said as he eyed Cordelia, though a grin was tugging at his lips. “I’ll let you know my decision in a few days… maybe.”

“You owe me the serum at the very least Xander Harris! After that scare you gave me.” Cordelia snapped, glowering at him. “Give me the serum and I’ll consider us even.”

“I was kidding with you.” Xander said rolling his eyes. “I’ll give all of you the serum once I prepared them.”

“Perhaps we should get back on track.” Giles continued firmly. “Even if the military believe that you’re an alien, how are you going to explain the base? I doubt they’ll take kindly to having an alien reside on American soil, even if you save a town full of people.”

“By the time I am done with the shield and cloak generators, they will not be able to even see or enter the base.” Xander said with a shrug. “And I don’t plan to stay on this base for long. I have some plans for the… future, and they don’t involve being stuck on Earth.”

“What do you mean?” Willow asked blinking in shock. “Xander, you can’t mean you’re going to actually use the starships and travel in space!”

“I have them, might as well use them.” Xander said holding up a hand to forestall Willow’s arguments. “All of you are welcome to join me on my voyage, but I need to warn you that I will not be just traveling in space for the sake of seeing the sights. My Arm Commander counterpart had seen space many times before. My real intention is to find a habitable planet and start the Arm race in this universe.”

“What!” Giles shouted in shock, for a moment losing control of his emotions as he realized what Xander was saying. “Xander! You can’t just let loose a race of such technological powerful beings into this reality. There would be grave consequences if they ever turned against Earth…”

“I told you guys the summarize version of what happened to the Arm people, but I never really told you what they suffered through for four long thousand years. Just to remain a true human being, a flesh and blood organic.” Xander said grimly. “Perhaps it is best if you see it and hear it for yourself.”

Giles jerked his head towards the door as it slid opened and men and woman close to Xander’s new height entered the room. All of them had perfectly sculptured bodies, with a dazzling variety of eye and hair colors. A particular pink pyramid bun on the head of a purple eyed woman left disturbing visual afterimages in Giles’ mind.

“Commander!” The gathered men and women said as they arranged themselves in orderly rows and columns, saluting Xander.

“At ease people.” Xander said as he straightened his body, giving them a firm nod. Turning to Giles and the girls, he introduced. “Everyone, meet the citizens of Arm.”

OoooO

One hour ago, Arm HQ situated at the edge of sink hole Sunnydale

Buffy could tell that Giles was majorly displeased at the fact that Xander actually cloned the beginning of a new race of humans. But this Xander, no matter how alike Xander’s mannerism was, had been changed by whatever magic casted by the Halloween shop keeper during Halloween night. It was not just the change to his physical appearance, somehow Buffy could sense a hint of cold hard strength that emit from Xander just by standing close to him. Her Slayer senses were picking up hints that Xander, and the Arm clones he had created, were more than human. Not evil human… just different human.

And then there were the Arm clones themselves. One hour into the briefing Xander was giving them about the situation they were now in, how they were magical by-products in a world free of Core tyranny, and how Xander was setting them free of any commands given by the Arm Council or Arm Commander, as Arm Code 101 was now in effect, the crowd of nineteen Arm citizens burst into cries and tears of joy.

Seeing the confusion on Willow’s face, Xander had explained in detail the ins and outs of Arm society. The four thousand years of war between the Arm and Core impacted greatly on the Arm faction who was weaker than the Core in almost every sense. The Arm consists of flesh and blood humans, even though they were cloned. The Core consists of human conscious stored within powerful mechanical bots. Five hundred years into the war, the Arm faction realized they must take drastic measures or the war would be lost within centuries. Thus Arm Code 100 was set.

Arm Code 100 states that all Arm citizens’ clone templates have to be altered, making them follow the commands of Arm Council or Arm Commanders unconditionally. Arm Code 101 was actually created in the event that Arm won the battle against the Core, and flesh and blood humans were allowed to live in peace again. Code 101 was the code that frees all Arm citizens from Code 100. Apparently the very uttering of the code by an Arm Commander was enough to trigger a signal in their neural implants that freed them from obeying any further orders made by the higher class of Arm society. In short, it gave the Arm citizens back their free will.

That revelation had at last given everyone in the group a clear picture of why Xander was acting the way he did. A whole race of humans suffering for their ideals against enemies they could barely defeat for four thousand years. Though they might be fictional here, Xander now possessed the means to reclone them, and give the Arm citizens a second chance at life.

Five of the new clones were apparently skilled Geneticists, and they were tasked to begin the process of altering the clone templates in the Arm’s clone database, so that Arm citizens would regain their free will instantly after they were cloned. The process would take years, maybe decades even, but at least it was a start.

Six others were skilled engineers who were tasked to make changes to the five Voyagers in the hangar, to make them more powerful and efficient, in preparing for Xander’s trip into the stars. The estimated manhours for full system upgrade of Voyager, using data provided by Xander, was eight hours, using the Arm faction’s mobile nano-lathe tools, which could replicate inorganic structures in seconds or minutes.

The last eight were combat crew, tasked with defending the current base, and monitoring their current surroundings should there be any real need to. By this time, the shield and cloak generators Xander created was up, and according to Xander, they were safer in the base than anywhere in the world.

“I am going with you.” Willow spoke up firmly as Xander dismissed the Arm clones after telling them that once preparations were complete in about a day’s time, they would set off in search of a new world for them to restart their society.

“Xander, I know you sympathize with them, but it is not a wise move to just clone a race of powerful people with unknown agendas!” Giles spoke up heatedly as the group was alone in the room once more.

“It is more than sympathy Giles, I know these people, I feel like I am part of them.” Xander said firmly. “They are basically good people who had to suffer through four thousand years of hell. They deserve a fresh start.” Xander held up a hand as Giles seemed to want to continue arguing the point. “And I have backup plans if a day ever comes where the Arm society turn against Earth. I consider myself part Earth and Arm human, I am not going to betray the planet I was born on.”

“But Xander…” Giles continued, only to pause as he saw the look of resolution in Xander’s eyes. The shoulders of the older man sagged. “Very well, I will go with you on your journey, if only to make sure you don’t end up destroying Earth by mistake.”

“Your trust in me is as reassuring as ever.” Xander said rolling his eyes before turning to look at Buffy and the other girls. “Willow, I’d be pleased to have you come with me. What about you two Buffy and Cordelia?”

“My home just sinks into a crater which probably became a lake by now.” Cordelia snarked. “I might as well go see the stars.”

“I…” Buffy’s eyes widened as she realized she had forgotten something very important in all the excitement. “Mom! She’s supposed to be in Los Angeles right now collecting art pieces…”

“You have a cell phone number?” Xander asked.

“What… yes I have.” Buffy said blinking at Xander’s question.

“So you want me to bring her here and give her the full reveal? Or you want to stick to the status quo and return to her without her knowing any better?” Xander asked, looking at Buffy as he asked the question.

“I…” Buffy hesitated as she looked around the richly furnished high tech meeting room, she looked at the changed Xander, and thought about all that had been said for those past hours. “Bring her here, give her the full reveal.”

“Alright then, I’ll tap into her cell phone signal, activate a scan, get her location…” Xander frowned in concentration as motes of lights appeared next to Buffy. “And bring her here…”

Joyce Summers reappeared next to her daughter lying on the floor fast asleep, her bags and belongings appearing next to her.

“She was sleeping when I located her.” Xander said with a shrug. “The military is stopping all news about Sunnydale from leaking out so she most probably hadn’t heard what happened. You want to wake her up Buffy?”

Buffy kneel down and gently shook her mother awake. As her mother opened her eyes in confusion, Buffy knew that her life had changed from that moment on.

OoooO

Hellish week…

And as always, work disrupted my writing past time. It has been a busy 1 month past since I ended up handling my superior’s job tasks along with my own. Busy and hectic are words to describe the past few weeks kindly, especially since a new series of projects are kicking in my workplace. Sometimes I feel like I am running around like a crazy chicken.

This week has been particularly bad. Running around liasing with people, arranging meetings, managing customers, planning schedules, while doing daily operations at the same time. I really talked till my saliva runs dry. There’s a few times I feel like slamming my head on the table. Especially since by the end of today I’ve finished 20+ tasks since the start of the week.

More than a few times I thought to myself why I have to work so hard when I am not being compensated for all those tasks. But if I don’t do them, who else are going to handle them.

My Piss-off-meter is starting to raise to above average level. One more week like this and I am getting ready to turn into the Hulk.

Warlock Xander (Prologue)

Story Title: Warlock Xander

Crossover: BtVS/ Charmed/ Multiple

Summary: Halloween night ended horribly for many. Mentally broken… in the end, Alexander might be the world’s only hope.

Prologue – Breaking Point

The soft resistance as blade meets flesh. The scraping of blade against bone. The feeling of thrill as new power rushed into his body through the blade. The girl in costume who was impaled on his blade gave a soft gurgle as she died.

Her power was now his to wield. The power of Time Bombs. To create variably sized yellow orbs of pure psionic energy that explodes with concussive and destructive force. The persona of the Warlock laughed as he basked in the power’s afterglow. The Warlock ruled over his body with iron control. The real Xander was however screaming inside his head, unable to get out, unable to control his own body that was killing all the children and teenagers around him.

The screaming… it seemed to go on forever. On a deathly still street, a young black haired man sat in the middle of the road, surrounded by numerous dead bodies of children and teenagers in costumes. The stench of blood and death hangs heavily in the air.

Dressed in her princess costume, Buffy looked gorgeous and Xander felt his heart skipped a beat. He felt very ordinary dressed in front of her in his everyday T-shirt and jeans. But then, it was not as if he had the cash to spare for a full blown costume. Not to mention he had outgrown Halloween years ago. A cheap two dollar dagger bought from the new Halloween shop and his costume was done.

“What are you supposed to be?” Buffy asked, tilting her head in puzzlement as she looked at him.

“You know the Charmed TV shows you and Willow forced me to sit in with every Wednesday?” Xander said with a grin as he held out the dagger which was his athame. “I am a powerful and evil Warlock from Charmed. The evil Warlock Xander who will steal all of your powers by killing you. Muwhahaha!”

Sounds of running footsteps, a red haired girl gasped as she ran into the street. Her face paled as she saw the bloodied and dead bodies. Tears ran down her face even as she vomited onto the street.

A sob choked her throat as she wailed. “Oh god no… Xander… oh god…”

The robed boy in front of him actually put up quite a fight, blasting at him with magical items. Even the Warlock’s new powers were barely able to bring the robed kid down. The athame slid into the boy’s body as the child’s face paled. The boy struggled weakly before lying limply on the athame. The Warlock pushed the body off even as new powers rushed into him.

Reality Manipulation: Alchemic Fusion. Creating alchemy items by fusing different items together.

Reality Manipulation: Item Read. Instinctively knows the history and use of an item.

Reality Manipulation: Item drops.  Defeated enemies may turn into items or money.

Reality Manipulation: Item Harvest. Harvesting items from harvest points all over the world.

The Warlock chuckled at the incredible abilities he now possessed. Powers which were out of this world. He knew not what was going on this very night. How he came to be in a strange street filled with many magical creatures all around him. But he did know one important thing… There were still a lot more powers for him to reap and possessed.

Blood… death… in the depths of his mind, he could only watch in horror as his own hands wield a real athame, killing those that had been changed during the night. The powerful coursing of energies within his body empowered him, filled him… and drove him to madness.

He screamed.

It was useless.

He struggled.

But his body no longer belonged to him.

Trapped in his personal hell, he could only watch as dozens of young children and teenagers died under his hands.

It was futile. He stopped struggling. Walls built up around him. He just wanted everything to end. Darkness surrounded him. He could not see anything now, hear anything now, feel anything now. Yes… it was better this way.

It was better if he was dead.

In the background… the screaming still goes on.

OoooO

Buffy watched from the fenced up area the police had set up. The dead bodies were already being carted off. Then there was the screaming, the screaming from Xander. Oh merciful god… Xander who had blood all over him, whom witnesses had confirmed to the police that he had killed everyone around him. Giles had managed to break the horrific spell that had turned a lot of people into their costumes… but it was too late, for many…

Willow was the first to find Xander, then Buffy had arrived after hearing the screams in the distance. Screams of a blood soaked Xander rocking in the middle of the street, his eyes clenched tight, unresponsive to a crying Willow who was by his side.

Then the police had arrived on the scene. Buffy and Willow had been wrenched away from Xander. The area was fenced up and Buffy managed to contact Giles for help while Willow wailed in anguish as she watched the police tried to knock Xander out to stop the screaming.

But no matter how many blows landed on Xander’s head, the screams continued, even as he began to bleed from the wounds. Buffy tried to intervene, but the police with their guns stopped her. Giles arrived, grey faced and grim. An ambulance had pulled up by then, and even Giles’ intervention was unable to prevent Xander from being tied up in a straitjacket as the orderlies carried him into the vehicle.

“Giles… what will happen to Xander?” Willow sobbed as Giles returned, a dark look on his face as Xander was driven off in the ambulance. “He didn’t mean to kill them. I know he didn’t mean it! Please! You have to help him!”

“I will try my best.” Giles promised bitterly. “I’ll call the Watchers’ Council and pull in some favours. They might be able to help. But even then… Xander will be placed on a murder charge. You have to prepare for the worse Willow… We have to prepare for the worst.”

Beside the two of them, Buffy stood still and silent. Her tears had long since dried up. Her heart was now numb. She watched the ambulance carrying Xander disappeared down the road… and for the first time in years, she prayed.

Please let Xander be alright.

OoooO

3 days later

General Lewis sighed as looked through the folder in front of him. “The Harris murder spree. So the Watchers’ Council had confirmed that the real cause was a magical blow up by a rogue magic user?”

“Yes General. The Council has contacted the White House to ask for an intervention. And as the department in charge of handling the supernatural in the States, this request is routed to us.” Major Bernard answered grimly.

“It’ll be difficult to cover this up. The case is all over the National news for the past three days.” General Lewis shook his head wearily. “The common public opinion is to lynch that poor kid. How is the boy in question?”

“He has stopped screaming after his voice ran out. Now he just stares into space. The psychologist profiling him had said that he is suffering immerse mental trauma, he might never recover.” Major Bernard said as his eyes drifted to the notes in his hands. “According to the Council’s analysis of the spell cast that night, it was a powerful reality warp spell that could only be cast within the vicinity of an active Hellmouth, when certain astronomical bodies are aligned in specific formations, an event occurring once every two hundred and thirty years. The spell that was cast, transform everyone wearing tainted costumes into what they were going as for Halloween night. It’s very powerful and unstable, lasting only for six hours. Those affected are unable to control their bodies as their Halloween personas took over. ”

“Which boils down to the fact that all of the senseless death was because of the thoughtless act of a magic user.” General Lewis growled. “But in the end, our hands are still tied. There is already too much public outcry about the case. If only we could have contained the incident before the press got wind of it. Now it is too late. The best I can do is prevent a death penalty, and ensure that the poor boy live in a contained facility. In the grand scheme he is just an unlucky soul in the wrong place at the wrong time, it’s highly unlikely the government will approve of me spending too much resources to help out the boy.”

“Alright, I’ll try to speak to the DA of the case.” Major Bernard said with a nod.

“Good. Also send out a notice to our team. I want that mage captured and imprisoned.” General Lewis said with a growl. “And send me the files on the Initiative program, we might have to jumpstart the whole project in light of recent events. It seemed that the supernatural world is becoming more and more dangerous in the States… and we’re going to need a counter for them soon…”

OoooO

2 months later

“And in a case which has shocked millions. The Trial for Alexander Lavelle Harris has been concluded… Known as the Murderer of Sunnydale, he killed 42 children and teenagers in Sunnydale’s suburb during Halloween night… The murder weapon was never found, though a plastic knife sleek with blood of his victims was discovered beside him. Numerous eye witnesses convicted him of multiple counts of murder… On plead of insanity, Alexander Lavelle Harris is sentenced to life imprisonment in the Fort Lenin facility at the outskirt of Salt Lake City…”

Willow choked back a sob as she stared at the news. The past two months had been especially hard on the group. Xander was labelled a murderer by almost everyone in Sunnydale. Only the small group had known the truth of what happened. Giles had called in all the favours he had from the Watchers’ Council and the best he could manage was to prevent Xander from getting a death penalty.

And none of the group had been allowed to see Xander after he had been taken away. Just the thought of Xander being tossed into a prison cell for a crime not totally of his fault, it had devastated Willow. She had lost Jesse to vampires, now she would lose Xander to the crimes of a rogue magic user.

Buffy was there throughout the ordeal. Surprisingly, Cordelia had been with them as well. She had been the only one at school who had not said one word of condemnation against Xander. But even then, it was not enough.

Willow had enough of being weak. Of letting the supernatural world destroy her friends, destroy her life. Willow could not stand this feeling of helplessness anymore. She would make a stand, become as powerful as can be, and maybe one day, she might be able to think of a way to free Xander.

And to begin her new resolve, there had been the little spells she had been learning. But after seeing what the rogue magic user had done to all those innocents around him, Willow knew corruption by magic was a valid concern. She would never want to become someone who would use magic to harm others, and the best person to ask for help would be Giles.

She would find Giles tomorrow, learn more magic, become more powerful… and one day… maybe one day she would be able to set Xander free.

OoooO

In his small cell, Xander sat at the edge of his metal bed, staring lifelessly into space. After ascertaining that he would not go violent for the past few weeks he had been locked in the cell, the guards had finally left out the straitjacket one week ago. His hands were untied, but even then, all Xander did was stare at nothingness, skipping meals and eating without expression once in a while.

The guards of the facility had left him pretty much alone by the end of his two month stay. Thus no one was around to notice as the dull eyed boy began chuckling, shivering and shuddering.

“Lights… lights all around… 42 of them floating inside me…” Xander muttered, an unhinged look in his eyes. “They cry out in pain… they cry out in pain… what if I touch one of them…”

Xander raised a hand and looked on crazily as a small yellow orb of energy began forming in his palm. “Lights… all around… I am sorry… I am sorry…”

And then the screaming began again.

OoooO

List of personas killed/ absorbed powers (Able to access only 1 Persona/ set of powers at a time):

—

Marvel verse

Tabitha Smith (Boom-Boom): Creates variably-sized yellow orbs of pure psionic energy that explode with concussive and destructive force.

Noriko “Nori” Ashida (Surge): Electrical generation and manipulation, superhuman speed

Alison Blaire (Dazzler): Ability to convert sound into light beams of various forms and intensity

Victor Creed (Sabretooth):Regenerative healing factor, Superhuman senses, strength, stamina, agility, and reflexes, Resistance to telepathic assault and control, Retractable claws, Fangs, Longevity due to healing factor

—

Mana Khemia verse

Game World Alchemist: Reality Manipulation (Alchemic Fusion, Item Read, Item drops, Item Harvest)

—

Charmed verse

Whitelighter: Orbing, Hovering, Glamouring, Healing, Photokinesis, Thermokinesis, Mind Manipulation, Sensing, Cloaking, High Resistance, Reconstitution, Regeneration, Immortality, Omnilingualism, Scrying, Spell Casting, Potion Making

Patty Halliwell: Molecular Immobilization, High Resistance, Spell Casting, Potion Making, Scrying

The Evil Enchantress: Telekinesis, Conjuring the Elements, High Resistance, Spell Casting, Potion Making, Scrying

Luck of the Draw (Chapter One)

Author’s Note: This story will have hints of mature theme, though I’ll try to keep it safe for young adults.

Story Title: Luck of the Draw

Author: Wraithrune

Crossover: Naruto/ Disgaea series/ Terry Pratchett’s Discworld/ Rogue Galaxy game/ Buffy the Vampire Slayer/ Starcraft

Summary: Once a millennium, the denizens of all the Netherworlds gather for a Netherworlds’ Lottery Draw. The winners walk away with unimaginable prizes but the odds of winning are one in an infinite chance. The Lottery is open to all of demonic and supernatural natures in the infinite realities, including one Uzumaki Naruto, demon container of the Kyubi…

Chapter 1: Winnings of a Lottery

Netherworld 31, Reality 890

Deafening roars from the gathered demons and supernatural creatures sounded in the crowded stadium stationed in Netherworld 31 in the Reality 890. There was a collective hush as the announcer of the night’s grand event stood on stage.

“Hello fellow demons and darksiders! Welcome all of you to tonight’s once in a millennium event, the Netherworlds’ Lottery Draw!” The announcer said with dramatic flair as he posed for the camera crew in front of him as they film him live for all the viewers in the multiple Netherworlds. “I, the Dark Hero Axel would be hosting tonight’s grand event as we hand out the 10000 supplementary prizes and the three grand prizes.

“As those of you gathered here or watching this live broadcast on their TVs will know, all demons and supernatural entities throughout the infinite realities are automatically entered into the Netherworlds’ Lottery Draw. So for most creatures of the dark, you have a better chance of dying than even winning once in your lifetime! But do not fear, because the results of the Lottery Draw could not be duped, for tonight as we had for all the Lottery Draws that had come and passed, we’ve invited one of the Deaths of the multi-verse to be our impartial judge! Let’s welcome… Death from Reality 10920!”

The gathered crowd who were cheering only moments before fell silent as a black cloaked skeleton with a giant scythe stepped on stage, waving at the crowd of demons and supernatural beings in their seats before him.

“HELLO.” Death said waving a skeleton hand. The gathered entities of the Netherworlds’ Lottery Draw gave a collective shudder in the suffocating silence.

“Ah yes well we have Death here now so let us continue with tonight’s event.” The host who had called himself the Dark Hero Axel said with a weak smile as he tried to break the silence, beads of sweat already forming on his forehead.

“THEY WERE MOST RUDE.” Death interrupted as he turned to the host who cowered before him. “ARE ALL DENIZENS OF THE NETHERWORLDS LIKE THAT?”

“What? Of course not.” Axel said with a squeak as he waved frantically at the gathered crowd. “They are just struck by your magnificence is all! Come on everyone cheer for Death!”

A chorus of frightened and halfhearted squeaks sounded in the stadium as the gathered demons and supernatural entities moved to response. It was never good to make any Deaths mad at you even if you were a demon or overlord.

“N…Now let us begin tonight’s event and start with the 1,0000 supplementary prizes to be given to those lucky demons!” Axel said as he tried to rally the crowd. Touching the panel in front of him, everyone watched as countless names of all the demons and supernatural beings in the multi-verse scrolled past in the air above the panel, hovering like holograms. “First up the 10000^th supplementary prize is a remote controlled starship kindly donated by the generous Overlord Laharl…”

OoooO

…9999 supplementary prizes later

“… And finally.” Axel gave a croak. He quickly drowned the bottle of water in front of him before continuing. “The 1^st supplementary prize. The winner will become the owner of two very unique minions. The minions are a captured Vampire Slayer from Reality 7834 who has been infected with a potent Zerg Strain from Reality 4603, as well as infused with demonic essence. She has been crafted to become a Demonic Slayer Zerg Queen! She’s well trained and house broken, perfect for every demon’s kinky needs! We also have a Fusion toad from Reality 638 who can conduct rare fusions of living and non-living objects!”

The gathered demons roared in approval at the prizes listed and all held battered breaths as Axel pushed the button on the panel in front of him for the 10000^th time. Axel felt like his hand was going to drop off any moment now. Thankfully, there were only the three grand prizes to go. Beside him, the minions of the 1^st supplementary prize appeared. The Demonic Slayer Zerg Queen was a short and pretty humanoid blond with an exotic pair of sharp bony wings on her back. Whoever had crafted her body had ensured that it still looked human in nature, apart from her wings. In the Demonic Slayer Zerg Queen’s hands contained the Fusion toad which was the size of a man’s head and was deep purple in color. The Demonic Slayer Zerg Queen stared at the ground emotionlessly as the crowd broke into wolf whistles and jeers.

The fast scrolling sea of demonic names paused as dramatic fanfare sounded at the side of the stage to announce the winner. A picture as well as a full biography of the winner flashed on the big screen.

“And there we have our winner of the 1^st supplementary prize. Uzumaki Naruto, container of the demon Kurama, of Reality 6678. Naruto is 95% human and 5% demon due to his long exposure to the dark energies of the Kyubi!” Axel cried out as the fanfare sounded beside him to announce the winner. “Let’s welcome him! Uzumaki Naruto!”

Roars spread through the crowd as the Gatemaster standing at the side of the stage waved her hand. Glows of white light merged into one big glow and a young blond human wearing pajamas with a toad design stood before all the demons on the stage as he rubbed his eyes tiredly. There was a pin drop silence as the demons took in the scene. Even the Demonic Slayer Zerg Queen and the Fusion toad looked startled at the appearance of their new master.

“Where am I?” The young boy asked in bewilderment as he looked at all the demons before him.

“Ah… ah… Congratulations Uzumaki Naruto for being the 1^st winner of the Netherworld Lottery Ball’s supplementary prize.” Axel said quickly as he moved forward with a ball of light in his hands as he motioned the two minions forward. In one swift strike, he pressed the ball of light into the young boy who jerked as energies roared through his tiny body. “Here’s your prize, the master and minion bonds to two very unique minions!”

“Huh?” The young boy asked unable to comprehend all that had happened.

“Now for the last three grand prizes!” Axel shouted desperately as he tried to gear the crowd back into its feverish peak. He made a quick hand signal at the side to the Gatemaster who nodded as she flicked her hands, causing the young demonic human hybrid boy and his two newly soul bonded minions to disappear from the stage.

Axel gave a relieved sigh, he hated those backwater bumpkins who never watched the Netherworlds TV. He had already encountered a handful of them while giving out the supplementary prizes, and their confusions were serious mood breakers. Those backwater bumpkins tend to arrive unprepared when they were summoned as winners to the Netherworlds’ Lottery Ball. Hopefully the winners of the top three prizes would have a more regal bearing…

OoooO

Planet ?, Reality 6678

In the darkness of the night. She stood silent and rigid, staring down at her new master. The young boy had dropped back to drowsy sleep the moment he was dumped into his bed by the Gatekeeper. Her new master seemed surprisingly innocent, but after all the long centuries trapped in the Netherworlds, being bartered among demons as merchandise, being used, tortured and even experimented on, Buffy Summers knew very well that the most angelic of faces could hide the darkest of hearts.

She had no more tears to shed. She was no longer a broken Slayer, who was treated as little more than a toy or pet, by powerful demons who could crush planets with a swipe of their hands. It had been three hundred years and fifty five days since her foolish dive into Acathla’s portal after Angel, all because her young naïve heart thought she could not live without her first crush. She had instead found herself separated from Angel by the energies of Acathla’s portal, dumped into a Netherworld where a demon had subdued and enslaved her. Through the centuries, she had passed many hands, even traveled multiple Netherworlds across many realities, to be used as meat shield, soldier, servant, assassin, a glorified living toy and experiment subject.

The powerful master-minion bond that the demons of the Netherworlds had bound her with stripped her of her free will. She could not fight or rebel against the demons who were her masters even if she wanted to. The first century of her life in the Netherworlds drove her to madness. She had only regained her mind in the later part of her life, almost two centuries into her stay in the Netherworlds. She had been infused with powerful demonic essences during the course of her enslavement, as those demonic lords who used her as foot soldier or assassin wanted her to be able to defend herself against minor demons of the Netherworld adequately. Her demonic abilities had include being able to turn invisible, cast powerful alignment magic, remain ageless, have a very high resilience to magical and physical harm, possessing enhanced strength and speed, having a regenerative pool of demonic energies, and the ability to draw in the lifeforce of those she had killed which would be converted into demonic energies.

The last experiment she had been subjected to have turned her into a human demon alien hybrid. Overlord Mastural who was her previous master, had obtained a powerful alien/humanoid lifeform from Reality 4603. Through many experiments, he had infused the alien traits into Buffy’s body, taking away her humanity, turning her into the perfect evolutionary fighting machine. She became able to assimilate the DNA of other lifeforms, even spawn lesser beings called the Zergs, her children, under her control. Numerous operations done to her body allows her to release the Zerg’s Hyper-evolutionary virus rapidly and in large amounts, as well as granting her psionic abilities. These abilities were then enhanced and honed through many of her Overlord’s experiments and field trials. She became a more powerful tool of war and an even more exotic human toy.

Through many experiments conducted by Overlord Mastural, Buffy discovered that she was able to pass her demonic abilities and traits to the Zergs she created. Extensive research made into her Slayer powers meant that she also knew how to pass her Slayer gifts onto her Zerg children. Under the horrifying experiments of Overlord Mastural and his grilling orders, Buffy gained a very fine honed control over the Zerg’s Hyper-evolutionary virus which she could release. She was able to control the virus at a molecular level, using her demonic energies to grow them rapidly into any Zergs she desire. She was even able to create new Zerg types by building up a new Zerg genetic structure.

One major difference between the original Zerg strain from Reality 4603, and Buffy’s evolved Zerg strain was that the original required the existence of special gaseous and crystal structures for the Zergs to grow and evolve rapidly. The new alien/demon/slayer Zerg hybrids Buffy was capable of creating was able to evolve purely on demonic energies, not needing any gas or crystalline catalyst. As his experiments concluded, Lord Mastural’s interest in her waned, and Buffy had been sold to the highest bidder.

That was when she became a prize to some random demon in the Netherworlds’ infamous Millennium Lottery Ball. It was also then she discovered that her control over her created Zerg children could be subverted by her master with just a command from him. Her children were now under her old master’s control. She was alone once more, in a new world, with a new master.

Buffy had expected her new master to give the command, to strip her of her free will. It was something that most of her past masters had done, only the truly powerful demons let her had free rein over her own thoughts and actions. After all, to demons powerful enough to destroy planets and realities, any of her plans to rebel would be doomed to failure. Her new master had however surprised her as he had fallen asleep without even issuing any commands preventing his new minions from acting against him. Either he was very powerful… or he was an idiot. Whichever the case, with no commands binding her, Buffy was free to control her own thoughts and actions. The only thing she could not do was to directly or indirectly kill her new master. She decided that she should find out more about this new world that her master lived in, before he wised up and start binding her free will.

With her enhanced psychic abilities, she was able to cast out a mind scan within a eighteen meters radius around her. She discovered the presence of many human minds. Entering those minds, most of which were asleep, she realized that she was in an apartment, in a ninja village, on a human world. A world which only knew nine powerful demons. She was unable to access the thoughts of her master due to the master-minion bond, but through the minds of those he entered, she learn that he was one Uzumaki Naruto, the village’s demon container, who had the most powerful of the nine demons in this world sealed into him. She also learns that Naruto had no idea of his burden, of why many in the village were weary of him.

Many of the minds she had entered were neutral towards her new master, some felt sorry for the boy, but there were a few that outright hated him due to the numerous death caused by the demon inside him before it was sealed. Yet by viewing their memories, she realized that the past deaths were none of her new master’s fault. In fact he was a bright and cheerful boy, who remained undeterred by the large amount of ostracisms he suffered at the hands of the villagers. Delving deeper into more memories, Buffy gathered more information about this world and her master who was apparently also an orphan.

It became obvious to her that the people of this world had no knowledge of the Netherworlds, which means the reality which this world was in was a neutral zone, and not occupied by demons or celestials. It also meant that her new master Uzumaki Naruto most probably did not know what the hell was going on.

For the first time in centuries, Buffy felt a flutter of hope. This new world, this new human master, might possibly be her way out of demonic enslavement. If the memories of the humans in the building were true, Uzumaki Naruto was an orphan and an innocent. He would be ridiculously easier to manipulate. Due to the nature of the master-minion bond, which was a soul bond, it meant that Buffy could not be more than half a mile away from Naruto without his express permission. He would also be able to sense the bond and access her thoughts anytime he wishes if he choose to. It meant that she could not just simply run away.

There was also the fact that should Naruto die, her master-minion bond would be passed to a demon slave trader. It was in Buffy’s continued interest to ensure Naruto live a ripe old life, or at the very least until she could find a way to be free of the demonic master-minion bond. But breaking the bond would not be an easy feat. A powerful item would be required to do it, but to create the item, several components found only in a few specific realities were needed. In the meantime, she needed to keep her new master alive, so that her master-minion bond would not transfer to another demon upon his death. This was her one chance! She needed to plan it right if she was to attain her freedom again!

“You have been standing very still. Croak.” The large purple toad in her hand spoke up, breaking the silence. Buffy had only gotten to know of the purple toad during the night of the lottery, when the demons had told her that she and the toad would be given away as prizes. The first thing the two had done when they had been alone was to get to know each other. In the Netherworlds, minions had to look out for one another, for there were no other beings that could do it for them.

“I have been accessing the situation Toady.” Buffy said with a smile as she eyed their sleeping master. “I am thinking that our luck has changed after all…”

OoooO

“Oh what a nightmare.” Naruto groaned as he woke up from his sleep to find the morning sun peeking through his window. His head felt heavy, like there were presences of some sort at the back of his mind. “Must remember not to eat too much ramen at night from now on.”

Naruto swung his legs over his bed, yawning and stretching before jumping up with a startled cry at the sight of a pretty blond girl around his height with a pair of sharp bony wings on her back, holding onto a large purple toad which was the size of his head. The girl stood right beside his bed, looking at him in amusement.

“It wasn’t a dream!” Naruto gaped at the girl and the toad as the memories of the night’s events came rushing back to him.

“Yes Master, it is not a dream.” The girl said with a bow. “We’re your soul bond minions.”

Naruto just continued to gape at them.

“Let me introduce myself Master.” The girl continued. “I am Buffy and this here is Toady. I am aware you might be confused as to what is going on. Would you like me to provide an explanation of what has happened?”

“I…” Naruto seemed lost for words. “I don’t understand. There were real demons last night! I thought it was a nightmare…”

“I see. Master is not aware of the Netherworlds then?” The girl, Buffy, asked. When Naruto shook his head quickly, the girl smiled. “Very well, I shall explain. Are you aware what realities are?… No?… Well think of realities as… different worlds, a lot of different worlds. Some of these realities contained the Netherworlds, homes to powerful demons, many who could devastate a single world in seconds. There was a great event held yesterday night known as the Netherworlds’ Lottery Draw which was open to all demons in the multi-verse. You won a prize, due to the demon sealed within you. As you may have guess by now. Toady and I are your prize. Our souls have been bond to yours in a demonic master-minion bond. We cannot refuse any of your commands. We’re in short… your slaves.”

“What!” Naruto was both horrified and outraged. The concept that there were numerous demons out there in other worlds frightened him. That they could enslave any living beings with this demonic master-minion bond sickened him even more. “That’s horrible! Are… are you demons?”

“No, I was a human, while Toady was a Fusion toad in his reality.” Buffy explained as Naruto’s eyes widened. “We have the misfortune to be captured and enslaved by demons. Our demon masters did many things to us, including many experiments, resulting in my current form.”

Naruto looked sickened as his eyes instantly went to the bony wings protruding out of Buffy’s back. “What… What is going to happen now? Are the demons going to be coming to my world?”

“Do not worry Master. Just as there are the Netherworlds, there are also the Celestials, home to powerful beings of righteousness who are the demons’ counterpart. A long time ago, the Celestials and the Demons agreed upon several core rules. No Demons or Celestials can enter a reality that does not contain either a Netherworld or Haven unless invited. Unless someone in your world knows the ritual to invite the demons or Celestials in, it is doubtful that any of them can enter and cause havoc in your world. Such realities are considered Neutral Zones.” Buffy explained patiently.

“That’s good to know.” Naruto said in relief before looking at Buffy with a frown. “But stop calling me Master, I am just Naruto. And how do I break this bond thing? I don’t want anyone as my minions or slaves or whatever you call it!”

“Unfortunately Naruto.” Buffy said with a smile. “That bond is not an easy thing to break, requiring an item which is difficult to craft. However if that is your wish, I will work towards resolving that issue. In the meantime, while Toady and I remain your minions, there’s a lot of help we can provide you with. We can help you fulfill your dream of becoming the best ninja, even the Hokage of this village!”

“Wow! What can you guys do to help?” Naruto exclaimed, instantly distracted at the thought of being able to achieve his dream. Then something occurred to him. “Wait! How do you know about my dream?”

“It is my job to know you wishes and needs.” Buffy just said simply. “Toady, why don’t you introduce yourself?”

“Very well, I am Toady. I am able to consume any items, even living beings, and fuse them together into a single item or being.” Toady spoke up, causing Naruto’s eyes to widen as he stared at the talking purple toad.

“You… can talk?” Naruto stammered in surprise.

“Yes Naruto.” Toady said bobbing his head. “I am sentient and capable of human speech.”

“That is so cool!” Naruto exclaimed as a grin lit up his face.

“Naruto will you like Toady to show you what fusion is actually all about?” Buffy prompted helpfully. “Do you have any items you no longer need that you wish to use in your test?”

“Oh… okay, give me a minute.” Naruto said as he got up, his eyes lingering on the two of them. He began searching his room for any old objects he did not want, to use to feed the toad.

He found an old broken kunai as well as an academy scroll on the academy replacement technique which he then brought back to Toady. A long pink tongue wrapped around the objects as the toad stuffed them into its mouth which stretched comically, the items then disappeared into the dark depths of its throat. Surprisingly, Toady’s stomach remained pretty much the same size as before, with no sign of him ever ingesting the bulky items. There were however sounds of metal crunching and paper tearing coming from the toad. As Naruto looked on in amazement, the sounds stopped and Toady spat out a blue glowing kunai from his mouth which was surprisingly free of slime.

“This is unbelievable!” Naruto said as he picked up the weapon which had a series of weird looking runes and seals embedded on its hilt. “Are all toads in your world able to do that?”

“My brothers and I are born with the gift of fusion. When I was enslaved by demons, the demons did many experiments on me to make my fusion ability drastically more powerful.” Toady explained, a pained look in his eyes. “I have in depth knowledge of all that items or beings I’ve created. That’s a teleportation kunai, it allows its wielder to teleport to the location where the kunai is being thrown.”

“I see…” Naruto said looking down at the kunai hesitantly. He then turned and quickly threw the kunai across the room, embedding it to the wall. There was a flash of light and he suddenly disappeared and reappeared to the area next to the kunai.

“This is so awesome! You are an amazing toad!” Naruto exclaimed excitedly as he fingered his new weapon in awe.

“I am glad to be of service Naruto.” Toady said bowing its head.

“As Toady has shown you, he can be a big help creating powerful items for your usage.” Buffy said with a smile. “I on the other hand can create… companions that can protect you or assist you in battle. Think of them as ninja animals. If you wish, I will begin to create them. As our new master, your continued survival is important to us.”

“Ninja animals? That’s great! Maybe that will stop Kiba from boasting about his puppy.” Naruto said with a grin, looking excited at gaining new companions. “Buffy, stop calling me master. You guys are helping me. I should be thanking the two of you. Wait till Sakura and Sasuke know about you…”

“Actually Naruto.” Buffy spoke up quickly, a frown on her pretty face. “I think it is best not to let others knows about our presence, or about the Netherworlds. The last thing you’ll want is for someone to go digging about demons and then summoning them to your world. There’s also the fact that the ninjas in this world may not take kindly to my… inhuman appearance as well.”

Naruto paused at Buffy’s words, some of his enthusiasm draining away, as his eyes soften in understanding. “Yeah I guess I know the feeling of not fitting in. The two of you can stay in my place. But I am not going to treat you as minions or anything. You can be my friends! But I am not sure how to hide you guys if my team visits, or to pay for the extra food…”

“Do not worry Naruto, I have an ability that allows me to hide from people’s perception.” Buffy said with a smile. “As for food, I can hunt and gather for essentials in any nearby forests. I can also create larger residences for all of us.  However to do that, and to create new companions for you, I will need permission to leave your side. The master-minion bond prevents us from leaving the ten meters radius around your person without a direct order from you.”

“That’s horrible.” Naruto said with a frown as he began thinking fiercely. Buffy and Toady seemed like nice person… and toad. To Naruto, slavery was inhuman. The Elemental countries had outlawed slavery centuries ago, ever since the time of the Sage of the Six Paths, though some countries still practiced it. Naruto knew he had to do something about the demonic bonds. Buffy and Toady were trying to help him, the least he could do was to grant them freedom from the bonds. With his mind made up, he turned to look at the two of them. “I don’t know how to free the two of you from the master-minion bonds, but I can do this for you. Here’s my order for the two of you. I order the two of you to live your own lives happily. You may come and go, do whatever you like as you please. You are your own people, not slaves to anyone. I wouldn’t stand for it. Just… don’t hurt anyone who doesn’t deserve it. I mean some of the people in this village may be a little nasty, but they don’t deserve to be hurt… too much. And my last order is that any other orders from me from now on are null and void.”

Buffy and Toady’s eyes widened in shock. To Naruto’s horror, tears began to well up in Buffy’s eyes. At first the tears fell silently. Buffy even looked surprised at the tears that trickled down her face, as if she had forgotten how to cry. Then her face contorted and she hugged Naruto as she gave great shuddering sobs. As Naruto tried in vain to get her to stop, Toady hopped onto her head and gave Naruto’s face a lick.

“Thank you Naruto.” Toady said in a solemn voice. “For giving us back our free will. Let her cry it out. She has been enslaved longer than me. The things her old demon masters have done to her are probably too horrible to talk about. I just want you to know that I will continue to assist you, even if you’ve freed us. So will Buffy. Because as long as the demonic bonds are intact, we’ll be passed on to a new demon master after your death. We’ll do everything we can to protect and assist you. What you’ve given us, our free will and a chance to break the demonic bonds, is a debt we can never repay.”

OoooO

The tears… she never thought she would cry again. She most certainly never thought her new master would give an order, giving back her free will. It was an act so unlike her previous demonic masters that she had never planned for it. Oh Buffy had known that Naruto was a human, an innocent. She had planned to manipulate him into giving her and Toady a degree of freedom, by acting the part of a sister. After all, he was an orphan, surely he would be pleased to have the company of someone who acted interested in helping him. Manipulation, seduction, hiding her true emotions, she had learned it all through her centuries of living in the Netherworlds. She just never expected Naruto to give a command ensuring her and Toady’s freedom… just like that, without even needing to manipulate him.

Uzumaki Naruto was a pure innocent child. It seemed that she had really forgotten what it meant to be a human. Guilt at what she had planned to do to her new master, coupled with the fact that she was essentially free to do as she wish, had caused Buffy to feel the surge of foreign emotions, something she had never felt for centuries. Relief, guilt and gratitude. It burst out of her and for the first time in centuries, she cried.

It was close to an hour before she was able to get herself under control. Naruto had seemed worried, but had grown more and more angry as Toady hinted that she had suffered greatly under her demon masters. With her emotions now in check, Buffy began to change her original plans. It was imperative that Naruto survive to a ripe old age. Because as long as he was alive, Buffy and Toady would be free to gather the resources they needed to obtain the items that would free them of the master-minion bonds. If Naruto was to die before they succeed in breaking the bonds, they would end up enslaved again under a new demon master.

That meant that creating Zerg companions to protect Naruto was now a high priority, especially since Buffy doubted the boy would allow her to follow him everywhere.

“Are you feeling better now?” Naruto asked, looking worried as Buffy began drying her tears.

“Yes Naruto.” Buffy answered with a smile, bending forward to give Naruto a kiss on his cheek, causing the young boy to blush a deep red. “Thank you for your command to give us back our freedom. Just know that I will continue to assist you for as long as you live.”

“Oh… you don’t really have to do that…” Naruto began but Buffy cut him off with a shake of her head.

“The debt I and Toady owned you, is something we might never be able to fully repay. The least we can do is to assist and protect you.” Buffy said with a smile. “In fact, I was thinking about creating new companions for you right now. I will need certain… environment in order to create your new companions, and the process will take several minutes or hours depending. Will you like to accompany me while I do that?”

Naruto’s face light up. “Of course. It’s my free day today anyway, no team meetings or anything. So… what kind of place do you need to create those new companions?”

“In order to do that, I’ll need to go somewhere deserted but with life.” Buffy said with a smile. “And I know just the place. Refresh yourself and I’ll take you there.”

Naruto nodded as he quickly grab some clothes and ran into the bathroom. Left with Toady for company while Naruto bath, Toady gave a croak. “So what are our plans now?”

“Protect Naruto, and find a way to break our bonds.” Buffy said simply. “What I told him is a promise. Even after the bond is broken, I will continue to assist him until he dies. The debt I own him… it’s the least I can do.”

Toady nodded in understanding. “That’s my promise to the boy as well. But we’ll need to plan carefully. It’ll take a long time to gather the resources needed to break the bonds.”

“I know, which is why Naruto’s safety is imperative.” Buffy answered. Toady hopped back into her hands and they settled down to wait for Naruto.

Naruto was ready in ten minutes. Buffy had to smile as the young boy looked excitedly at her. “So where are we going? And how are we going there? The villagers will talk if they saw your… wings.”

“We’re going to fly.” Buffy said as she opened the window to Naruto’s room. Her mind scan told her that there was an Anbu, a high level ninja operative, ordered by the village’s leader to watch over Naruto stationed nearby. A quick nudge of the Anbu’s memories would however ensure that he would not see her, even if Buffy was standing in front of him. If there was one advantage her old demonic master had given her, it was the powerful psionic ability that he had implanted and molded in her through numerous experiments, which the humans of this world were unable to counter. Of course the ability was useless against high level demons, but then, there were few of such demons in this world, if the memories of the humans in this village were true.

“Fly?” Naruto’s eyes widened as Buffy handed him Toady and then carefully linked her hands around Naruto’s waist.

“Yes fly.” Buffy said gesturing to her wings. “My old master… the one who crafted the wings onto me… he ensured that I was able to fly with them through a mixture of demonic magic and Zerg genes. I am also able to hide myself from sight, so do not worry.”

Naruto nodded wearily in understanding as Buffy gripped him tightly, before launching out of the open window. Modifying the memories of those who happened to look up into the sky, Buffy ensured that none of them would remember seeing Naruto and her flying above them. Flapping her wings, Buffy used them to soar through the morning sky. She had scanned a lot of minds and memories during the previous night while Naruto had lain asleep. Her body had been heavily altered during the many experiments her demonic masters had done to her in the past. As such, Buffy was able to store all the information gathered from the mind scans, allowing her access to knowledge about this new world, the village Konoha which Naruto lived in, the ninjas with their unique chakra abilities, and even the layout of the surrounding lands.

As such, tapping into the memories of an Anbu, she was now flying towards the forest surrounding Konoha, deep into a place known as the Forest of Death, the Forty-Fourth training ground, where numerous dangerous creatures lived, and where Konoha ninjas seldom tread. The journey took less than fifteen minutes by air, by then, Naruto was comfortable enough with the notion of flying and was gazing down below him in delight, Toady clenched tightly in his arms.

As they flew over the Forest of Death, Buffy began surveying the land from the air, before descending down into a clearing. Naruto looked around him in delight, taking in the tall trees and plants which he had never seen before, all around him.

“This is great!” Naruto said, still excitedly over his flying trip. “What are we going to do now?”

“Now?” Buffy answered with a smile. “I am going to create your new companions.”

Buffy laid a hand on the soft grass on the ground as she began to go into a deep trance. With the dominant Zerg Queen gene incorporated into her body, Buffy was able to call up all the different Zerg genetic structures instantly in her mind. Numerous experiments by Overlord Mastural had allowed her to tap into the demonic powers which her altered body possessed, to quickly spawn different Zerg structures or offsprings. Triggering a wave of power from her body, Buffy unleashed a pool of Zerg Hyper-evolutionary virus into the ground below her. Boosted by her demonic energies, the infestation quickly spread into the land, plants and whatever living creatures that were around them. Her powerful control over the virus that she had unleashed allowed Toady and Naruto to be unaffected.

She sensed as the infestation took over a family of mice deep underground. Six poisonous snakes close by were affected, as well as three large tigers, and numerous insects. Her powerful control over the virus allowed her to use the virus to rewrite the genetic structure of the lifeforms they had taken over. The family of mice had their genetic makeup rewritten and merged to become a Zerg larva, which would then begin the process of evolving into a Zerg hatchery. She might have promised Naruto to create companions for him, but she had her own plans as well, and for that, she needed a base of operations.

The six snakes had their genetic makeup overwritten by the genetic structure of a modified Zergling which possessed several demonic traits that Buffy had assimilated. However, even with her demonic energies powering the change, the whole process would take close to half an hour. The six would be evolved into Zerglings which would guard over the area which Buffy had chosen to set up as her first base.

As for the tigers, one of them would stand guard over the base while the other two would become Naruto’s companions, after she had made some modifications to their genetic structures. The humans of this world had never encountered beings such as the Zerg before. As such, sending one of her children created based on the original Zerg templates to be Naruto’s companion would raise a lot of questions. Since she had better things to do then to continuously wipe the minds of the humans in this world, she needed a way to protect Naruto, as well as ensure that she had time to begin her quest to find a way out of the master-minion bonds she and Toady were under. That meant that she needed to fly under the radar of the humans in this world so that they would not cause unnecessary trouble to her, Toady or Naruto.

The outer physical appearance of the tigers remained unchanged. Since the tigers were animals of this world, none of the humans would suspect anything otherworldly about them. Genetically wise however, the tigers were infused with Zerg and demonic genes, as well as Slayer abilities which toughen them up considerably. Additional glands began to evolve inside the tigers, enhancing their movement and attack speed. They also had a throat gland that contained Neural Parasites, allowing them to release large quantities of the parasites into their own saliva. The parasites would enable the three customized Zerg units to control whoever was infected with the parasites. Their intelligence had also been enhanced, making them capable of basic tactical thoughts. With her demonic energies speeding up the changes, the evolved Zerg tigers would complete their changes in several minutes.

As for the swarm of insects inflicted by her Hyper-evolutionary virus, they became carriers of the virus under her control. A command from her sent the most of the insects flying out into the surrounding areas to infect more animals in the forest. She instructed three of the bugs however, to stay near Naruto, and to attack whoever threatened him. Since those infected by the virus would come under her control, she would be assimilating whoever attacked Naruto into the Zerg swarm. Unless those attackers happened to be compatible with the virus, their consciousness would be destroyed as their genetic codes were rewritten

“What is this stuff?” Naruto was asking as Buffy broke free of her trance. Spreading the Hyper-evolutionary virus rapidly and speeding up the evolution of several creatures was causing a heavy drain on her demonic energies, but at the very least, she would have enough energy left to rapidly evolve three other creatures. The rest of those infected by the Zerg insect swarm would evolve at a much slower pace as the virus rewrites their genetic codes without the boost of demonic energies.

“This is the creep.” Buffy said as she saw Naruto prodding at the purple-reddish tangle they were standing on, which used to be soft grass. The surroundings around them had been drastically changed. Bushes and plants had evolved into creep or boils of creep tumor, the tall trees near the clearing were now dried and withered. “The creep is a living being that would nourish any creature or structures I create.”

“It looks and feels a little strange.” Naruto said as he laid a hand on the warm pulsing creep. “So how are you going to create those new companions you were talking about?”

“I have already begun the process.” Buffy said with a smile as Toady hopped out of Naruto’s arms onto the creep, testing it by bouncing on the ground a few times. “We’ll only need to wait a little while longer before your new companions are ready.”

“Really?” Naruto asked in delight, looking around the clearing which was now covered in creep. “So what are they like?”

“You’ll see in a few minutes Naruto.” Buffy said as she sat down on the warm pulsing creep. “Why don’t we take this time to learn more about each other? Who do you like? Do you ever want to be more than a ninja?”

The questions had the predicted effect as the young excitable boy began to open up to her and Toady. Being able to scan the minds of the people in the village, Buffy had gathered valuable data about her new master through the memories of his friends and teachers. As such, Buffy had a pretty good idea of what Naruto’s character was like. Learning more about her new master through her interaction with him would however give her a better grasp of Naruto’s inner thoughts and desires.

Naruto was telling Toady and her all about his pink haired teammate, who was apparently also his crush since academy school, when Buffy sensed three conscious minds linking to hers. The genetic modifications of the Zerg Tigers were apparently completed. Sending a command to the tigers, she ordered one to begin patrolling the perimeters, while instructing the other two to come forward into the clearing. A rustle of withered bushes announced the arrival of the two Zerg Tigers. Naruto quickly leapt to his feet, eyes wide in horror at the size of the tigers.

“Naruto, these are your new companions.” Buffy introduced, watching as the boy’s face shifted from shock to cautiousness. Mentally, she was commanding the two Zerg Tigers to watch and keep guard over Naruto, and to accept him as their new Overmind.

“For real?” Naruto asked, his breath hiking. The two tigers prowled to Naruto’s side and then bumped his frozen bodies with their heads, nearly bowing him over. For a moment the younger boy looked shocked and pale before he hesitantly reached out to scratched the head of the tiger to his right. It began purring in pleasure, causing the boy to laugh in relief. “They’re great!” Naruto cried out happily after a few minutes of petting the two tigers who hang upon his every words.

“They’re quite intelligent, able to understand basic commands.” Buffy revealed. “Let them follow you wherever you go, they will be able to protect you from most harm.”

“I don’t need them to protect me.” Naruto said, seemingly insulted at the slight to his combat abilities. His frown dissolved however as one of the tiger licked him. Laughing and wiping his wet face, Naruto continued. “But thank you Buffy, they’re the best nin animals ever!”

“No problem Naruto.” Buffy said with a smile. “I have given you my promise to help you. This is but only fulfilling a portion of it. I promise you. Whatever dreams you have, Toady and I will do our best to help you achieve it. For from this day on, your life, and our lives have changed… intertwined with each other.”

Book 2: Order of the Silver Hand (Chapter One)

Story Title: Order of the Silver Hand

Crossover: BtVS/ Warcraft III/ Stargate/ Stargate Universe/ Multiple

Disclaimer: I do not own, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Warcraft games verse, Stargate TV verse, or any other fandoms I will be dabbling in. This is a work of fan fiction, written without profit, for the enjoyment of fans of these great fandoms.

Summary: He is the One who can Build Anything. He is the heir to Magic. Bestowed with great powers, yet at the same time crippled by it, he will change the universe.

Chapter One: To Light a Path

Present time, within The Enterprise…

Joyce felt a tingle of thrill in her stomach as she lay lunch on the large table which everyone was seated around. It was her first lunch in outer space, and even now, Joyce could hardly believe a lot of things she had been exposed to for the past two months.

“So what’s our next stop?” Giles asked as everyone tucked in to the meal which had been prepared by Joyce and Jenny.

“First, we’ll be going to check out the Accendia Semita.” Xander revealed. “In Alteran, it means To Light a Path. It was one of the Alteran’s key shipyard and space station, though what is now left is nothing but wreckage. Its location is right outside the dark space surrounding our solar system. We can reach it in minutes via hyperspace. But I am guiding the ship using its sublight engines to our destination so that we can have our lunch first. The speed for sublight to the Accendia will take close to three hours, so we can relax and have a long lunch break.”

“So we’re going to check out wreckage?” Buffy asked with interest. “Think we’ll find anything there?”

“The Alterans left the Milky Way close to 30-40 Million years ago didn’t they?” Willow asked as she looked up. “How much of the Accendia actually survived?”

“According to the database compiled by Lauger thousands of years ago, he stated that only the skeleton of the structure survived. Cosmic decay had degenerated most of its superstructure, not to mention passing meteorites and gas clouds over the millennium have destroyed much of what’s left.” Xander recited between munching his food. “The database of the station was also completely purged by the ancient Alteran when they abandoned it and fled the Milky Way during the plague.”

“Oh…” Buffy said, taken aback. “So we’re actually going there to sight see some ancient wreckage?”

Joyce saw Xander rolling his eyes. “Not exactly, I am going to repair it.”

“Re..argh frr…” Willow choked and coughed in surprise, downing a glass of water. “You are going to repair an ancient Alteran space station?”

“And shipyard.” Dawn piped up helpfully.

“Yes I am going to repair the Accendia.” Xander said, his eyes twinkling mischievously. “The dimensions stated in the database placed the Accendia at 950 meters in height and depth. It might take me one or two hours to repair it, deconstruct it and construct it again.”

“Oh my…” Joyce said in the stunned silence.

“Is there any need for you to really do that?” Giles asked, looking a bit unnerved at the thought of Xander having an actual alien space station as his blueprint.

“I can’t really fight tyrannical aliens using only ships like the Enterprise.” Xander said with a sigh. “Lauger did not exactly design his ship for offensive purposes. Terin showed me visions… of humans out in space, of them living under aliens who did terrible things to them, some of which I have already identified as the Goa’ulds, worm like aliens who burrows into humans and then controlled their bodies.”

“Argh… can you like skip that part? We’re eating here.” Cordelia spoke up in disgust.

“Okay, like I was saying, I’ll need ships more offensive in nature in order to free humans and aliens who are suffering out there in the galaxy. And to do that, I’ll need to repair the Accendia and bring it under my control.” Xander explained.

“Xander… you’re only seventeen.” Joyce spoke up carefully. “You’re not responsible to save everyone in this universe.”

“I made a promise. Even if I can’t save everyone, at the very least I’ll save those that I can.” Xander said firmly.

“You wouldn’t be doing it alone Xander.” Ian spoke up. “You’ve all of us to help.”

“But repairing an ancient space station millions of years old…” Jenny cut in. “Can its technologies even stand up to ships owned by the aliens of this galaxy at this current time?”

“The Alterans and the Lanteans were one of the most technologically advanced races in the galaxy. Lauger made an assessment of the Goa’ulds’ capabilities back when they controlled Earth. Their technologies were unable to stand up to Lantean or even Alteran technologies during that period of time. They might have improved their sciences after all these thousands of years, but I believe the dated Alteran tech will still give us an edge.” Xander said. “It is better than nothing after all.”

“So how does your repair ability work exactly?” Giles asked curiously. “You just use your power on it and it’ll somehow mystically repair itself?”

“Yes, and it will repair the Accendia back to its prime condition. The memory of its history when it was at its best.” Xander said as everyone listened in. “But getting onto the space station will require some tricky manoeuvring since I need to have contact with the structure to repair it. That’s why I’ve gotten Yalen to assist me in some preparation before the trip.”

“What kind of preparation?” Willow asked with interest.

“You’ll see when we get there.” Xander said with a grin. “Our ETA is still two hours out. How about a movie after lunch?”

OoooO

Present time, darkness of space outside solar system…

Dawn watched in delight as the giant wreckage of the Accendia Semita came into view outside the cockpit. She listened as Xander began to outline what was going on even as he and Yalen each took out a small oval jewelled device from their pockets and proceed to stick it to their chests.

To the surprise of everyone, the oval devices began glowing an emerald green, remaining attached to their chest even after they took their hands away. Everyone close by was also pushed back several feet by an unseen force.

“What the hell is that?” Cordelia asked as she scrambled for footing. She stretched a hand outwards and her muscles strained, seemingly pressing against an invisible wall.

“This is the Lantean’s version of a spacesuit. The glowing green oval shaped device is actually a mobile forcefield generator which can last for a week if it is fully charged.” Xander explained taking out a second oval device from his pocket, he placed it next to the device on his chest and it began glowing a soft yellow. “For offworld protection, it can generate a forcefield slightly above skin level to protect its user from physical harm. For travelling into vacuum, the forcefield will enlarge in order to entrap air. A secondary mobile air purifier device, the yellow glowing device, is also used in conjunction in order to ensure the air is fresh.”

“You know, I think I saw those two devices back at the workshop when I was there using the database.” Willow spoke up with a frown. “I didn’t think to find out what they are, I thought they were simply ornaments since they don’t have any buttons or anything that can be pressed to activate them.”

“That’s because these two devices operate by mind waves, in other words, neural control.” Yalen took up the explanation. “They are specially synched with the higher level mind waves of the Lanteans, and a specific genetic marker that the Lanteans possessed is required to activate them. Xander tasked me and a few others to see if we can customize these devices to our needs. It took us a week to rewrite the core codes of both types of devices so that Earth humans and the rest of us in the Order could use them.”

“We’ve made enough of those devices for everyone. Ian and Tain will distribute them to all of you and teach you guys how to use them while we’re away.” Xander continued. “Better to be safe than sorry after all. But before that, there’s something I need to tell you guys, in case something happened out there… which might end up lengthening the repair and construction process for quite a while…”

OoooO

Present time, darkness of space outside solar system…

To say Giles exploded when Xander revealed that he was suffering from powerful uncontrollable visions was an understatement. The older man had given Xander a good talking to after finding out that Xander had hidden such an important thing from the group. Xander knew that Giles was only worried about him though, the man was practically a father to him with the time they had spent together.

Giles had hit the books he had brought with him after that, intent on researching Xander’s condition, even though Xander had assured him that he had every magic users in his Order looking into his condition. That gesture however warmed Xander’s heart, it had been typical Giles behaviour, even though Xander wanted to tell the older man that he was no longer the goofy boy he knew… not after all the things Xander had done, had seen and understood all these months…

He was treated to the sight of vast starry darkness as he appeared on the platform of Accendia with Yalen beside him. Giving him an understanding nod, Yalen stepped back so that Xander had room to work. Xander looked at the platform before him and let out a sigh of relief when he was not hit by a rush of visions. Bending down he lay a hand on the ground, the forcefield acting as an insulating layer between his hand and the cold vacuum frozen metal of the platform.

Tapping into his Power of Repair, Xander hammered down on the platform. He felt his magic flow into the forcefield and out into the platform itself, reaching deep into the structure to strength its history of its Prime Condition. He continued hammering more blows onto the platform, sending more magic flowing into the structure. According to his prediction, the whole repair might take close to an hour or maybe a little bit more. As his mind began to drift, Xander wondered what the Accendia would look like in her prime condition. Whatever the case, he was sure it would be impressive.

OoooO

Present time, darkness of space outside solar system…

It was an awe inspiring sight as Accendia began to be repaired as Xander worked his magic on the platform far below. The broken hull began to straighten and gleam anew. The interior of the structure began to fill itself up. The group however suffered a moment of horrifying shock as starships begun appearing on the extended platforms which had been repaired. The Paladin Tain barely had time to yank on the controls of Enterprise and guide the ship away from Accendia when a large starship appeared below them, attached to the platform Xander was standing on.

Xander must have been deep into repairing Accendia because the distant figure of the boy gave no signs that he had noticed what had happened.

Jenny laid a shaking hand on her heart. It was a good thing everyone was crowded around the cockpit to see what was going to happen. It was incredibly good luck that Tain just happened to be standing beside the controls, and was one of the two people currently on board that knew how to operate the Enterprise manually.

“What was that?” Buffy shouted in shock, looking pale at their harrowing escape. “Xander was supposed to only repair the Accendia! Where did all those starships come from?”

“I believe Xander said that his power allows him to repair structures back to prime condition.” Jenny said shakily. “Having its docks and platforms filled with ships was probably prime condition for Accendia.”

“That was quite a scare.” Tain said gravely as he guided the ship back further. He halted the Enterprise however as a golden forcefield sprung up around the space station, trapping them within. “I think Xander’s almost done with his repairs. We need to go warn Xander, with the station’s forcefield up, we might be deconstructed along with the Accendia if he proceeds with his deconstruction.”

“I’ll teleport over.” Ian, the Archmage said, attaching the mobile forcefield and air purifier devices onto himself before he vanished in swirls of magic.

In the meantime, Tain guided the Enterprise back to the platform Xander, Yalen and now Ian were standing on, carefully avoiding the large starships that now flank both sides of the platform. Tain suddenly let go of the ship’s controls as the Enterprise began moving on its own.

“I think Xander’s back in control.” Tain said just as the three figures on the platform vanished and reappeared outside the corridor of the cockpit.

Xander looked apologetic as he stepped into the crowded cockpit, his forcefield device apparently deactivated. “I am sorry guys, Ian told me what just happened, I never expected Accendia to contain starships in her docks back in her prime condition, though I should have considered it.”

“Don’t beat yourself over it. No one can plan for everything.” Joyce said firmly. “And we’re all fine, so let’s just be grateful for that.”

“I guess so.” Xander said hesitantly before brightening up. “You guys wouldn’t believe the amounts of technologies Accendia possesses. She even has a matter transporter! Just like those on Star Trek, though the devices are large and heavy in energy usage, and only the larger and more powerful space stations could support them. There’s also the Alteran version of the Star Trek replicator device, matter energy constructors and lots of other tech!”

“Oh transporters!” Willow said in delight. “Can you transport us right into the space station?”

“Not right now, I still don’t have direct control of the station, and I suspect that the database of the Accendia will be too massive for me to comprehend even if I link up to it. Our organic minds unfortunately have a memory retention limit, I’ve already lost most of the knowledge I got from accessing Lauger workshop’s database. I need to constantly link back to the structure to get back those knowledge.” Xander revealed. “Hero units cope much better because their memory retention ability is probably a hundred times better than me and any ordinary humans due to their high intellect.”

“So what’s the next step of the plan?” Dawn asked excitedly. “Deconstructing the Accendia?”

“Yeah, but first I need to let the Enterprise leave Accendia’s perimeters. I’ll be getting Ian to teleport me to the Accendia’s Command room, after which I’ll guide Enterprise out.” Xander explained. “All of you wait for me while I deconstruct Accendia.”

“I suppose that means Ian will be deconstructed along with the station?” Joyce asked as she looked at the Archmage.

“I will be teleporting out at the last second.” Ian replied. “And even should I be deconstructed, I know that Xander will recreate me, so there’s no need for worries.”

“Alright, just stay safe.” Joyce said to Xander and Ian. “We’ll be waiting onboard.”

Xander nodded to everyone as Ian laid a hand on him and both of them disappeared. After a few minutes, Enterprise began moving, passing through the golden forcefield which surrounded Accendia safely. They began standing by the cockpit, watching Accendia as the deconstruction takes place. However the minutes began to stretch, and by the time an hour had passed, Jenny was beginning to feel worry.

“Is it supposed to take this long?” Dawn asked as she began to fidget. “The Accendia is still whole, shouldn’t some parts of it have disappeared?”

“I’ll go over to take a look.” Yalen said as he disappeared using the teleportation spell. A few minutes passed before Yalen returned, looking grim faced. “Xander’s caught in the thrall of another vision, it will take him a while before he’s free from it.”

Joyce stepped forward, her eyes narrowing in concern. “Take us over there. We need to see what is going on.”

OoooO

Seven hours later, in Accendia…

His pale face and blank eyes would remain in Giles’ memories for quite a while. When the group had received news that Xander was caught in another vision, everyone had teleported over with Yalen’s help. Seeing Xander in an unresponsive state for close to two and a half hours had shocked everyone. Though the group was in an admittedly high tech Command room, none of them paid their surroundings any mind as they attended to Xander. In the end it was decided that Xander be brought back to the Enterprise to recover.

When Xander had awakened from his trance, the stubborn boy had insisted on returning to the Accendia to deconstruct the space station even though Giles and Joyce had tried to discourage him from it. This time the deconstruction and construction went on smoothly, with Xander guiding the Enterprise back into Accendia’s confines. Everyone had then found themselves disappearing in a shower of lights to reappear back in Accendia’s Command room.

Xander had tried giving everyone a tour of the station, but everyone could tell that the boy was noticeably wearily after his ordeal. In the end Xander was able to pass Tain, Ian and Yalen enough information to operate the systems on Accendia while he retreated into the Commander’s quarters to take a much needed rest.

Since it became apparent that they would be staying on the Accendia for sometime, the group began shifting some of their things from the Enterprise into the various living quarters near the Command room. Dinner had been an experimental affair as Tain, Ian and Yalen gave everyone a guide on how to use the Alteran’s replicator type device for food.

Ian had been able to make some modifications to the translation program he had created to interface the database of the Lantean workshop and Enterprise, and implement them into Accendia’s systems. Being able to browse through the Alteran menus in English certainly had been a big help to everyone in the group.

In the large mess area near Accendia’s Command room, Giles sat with everyone at a table while he consumed his bowl of hot mystery meat stew which tasted a lot like chicken.

“Thinking about Xander’s condition?” Jenny asked, noticing his faraway look.

“The boy should have told me about it back when it first happened.” Giles said with a defeated sigh. “I might have been able to tap into the Council’s resources and find something that might have helped.”

“Actually Reina contacted the Watchers Council for all their books on visions and seers right after she learnt of Xander’s condition.” Yalen spoke up. “She and a group of magic users are pouring over the tomes for information back on Earth. Some of the Archmages are also liaising with the magic users of Earth to create an artefact that can block visions. Don’t worry too much about it Giles. There should be a solution to the problem soon enough.”

“I know Xander has almost limitless resources at his disposal. But at the end of it all, he’s still a teenager, he shouldn’t have the responsibilities of worlds on his shoulder, or try to take on everything by himself.” Giles said grimly. “What he’s going through is already changing him, he needs people who can help him with his burdens, and give him sound advice.”

“That’s true Giles.” Joyce said nodding from across the table. “That’s one of the reasons why I insisted on accompanying Xander on his journey.”

“If only we can help with all this starships and higher tech stuff.” Willow said looking around the sophisticated mess area they were in. “Sometimes I wish I have a direct link in with Xander so that he can just pass me all those high tech knowledge. I am starting to feel more like a tag along, it is not as if I have anything to contribute.”

“If it is Alteran sciences you are after… we might be able to pass them to you.” Tain spoke up slowly, causing everyone to pause and look at him. “Xander passed Ian, Yalen and me significant knowledge pulled from the Accendia’s database before he went to rest. But the whole database was too massive for us to even retain in our heads. In the end he extracted only the key information and split them up. Yalen received a lot of Alteran engineering knowledge, Ian got most of the key science subjects, I received most of the information on Alteran’s biological science, and how to use their medical equipment onboard Accendia. There’s one particular equipment on Accendia that falls under the Alteran’s medical department. Loosely translated, it is called the Information Transfer device.”

“Information Transfer device?” Dawn asked with interest as she stared at Tain. “You mean it transfer information into someone else? Like what Xander did with you guys?”

“Yes it operates in a similar fashion.” Tain said with a nod. “It has a direct connection back to the Accendia’s data core. The device itself will analyse the user’s brain waves and capacity, after which an operator will set the amount of information to transfer into the target’s brain via electronic waves.”

“Wow.” Buffy said sounding impressed.

“How safe exactly is this device?” Giles asked with a frown.

“A hundred percent safe for the Alterans, though adjustments will have to be made to the device to accept our body types, which might be very different from the Alterans.” Tain replied. “With the knowledge Xander had passed me, I am capable of making those adjustments and operate the device on all of you safely.”

“So we can learn everything we wanted?” Willow asked as she beamed in delight.

“Not everything, it depends on your individual mental capacity which will be measured by the device.” Tain explained to the attentive audience. “It’ll be best to pick the general Alteran science and then a specialised field of knowledge to transfer, since even the Alterans aren’t able to safely retain a hundredth of the knowledge available in Accendia’s database. Ian, Yalen and I can push that limit due to our maxed out Hero units status but normal people can’t do that.”

Dawn began bouncing excitedly on her seat much to the amusement of Joyce who shook her head at her youngest. “What are we waiting for then? Let’s try out the device!” Dawn said in excitement. “I’ve always wanted to be a scientist!”

OoooO

Two hours later, in Accendia…

Willow was the first to get under the Information Transfer device which looked very much like a dentist’s chair with a row of head drills.  After getting over her horrifying first impression and the fifteen minutes of information transfer which had left her brain momentarily in a daze, Willow was more than glad that she went through with it. Her mind was now more ordered, she could even pull clear memories of events that happened from her past, memories that she did not even know she had retained. Tain had belatedly revealed that having a photographic memory was one of the side effects of using the device.

Willow however did not regret the decision, and she could tell that none in the group actually regret it. Willow now possessed knowledge of the Alteran general sciences, knowledge of how to use the common devices on Accendia, with specialized knowledge pertaining to Alteran quantum and energy generation sciences.

Everyone had decided right at the beginning to take the general sciences and knowledge of usage of common Alteran devices, with each of them specializing in a particular field, so that that could take on different roles to help out Xander.

Buffy had chosen to specialize in piloting, with in depth knowledge of the different Alteran ship controls. Joyce had chosen to specialize in horticulture and life support, Dawn had chosen to specialize in engineering and mechanical science, Jenny had chosen to specialize in navigation and computer science, Giles had chosen specialization in computing and languages, while Cordelia had chosen to focus in medical science.

The feeling Willow experienced as she tapped into the enormous amount of information now available to her was something that she did not have a word for. All she was certain of was that she was not useless now, or at the very least, not as useless as before. She might actually be able to help Xander by tapping into her new knowledge. One thing’s for certain, she would not be the shy, quiet and helpless Willow Xander used to know. She could not be, not when Xander needed someone who could be strong enough to stand beside him. For Xander, for her best childhood friend, and for someone she loved her whole life, she would change, just for him.

OoooO

Six hours later, in Accendia…

“It is too early to deal with this.” Xander grumbled, his face halfway dropping into his morning pancake. He had woken to the screams of Willow being chased by two of Accendia’s servitors. The servitors were androids possessing strikingly human appearances, constructed by the Alterans to maintain the manual labours tasks around the station. Xander had to mentally disable the servitors after he discovered that someone had inputted a set of commands, using the servitors to prank Willow.

The chaos had woken everyone, and it was not very long that Xander got an update of the events that happened while he had been asleep. Apparently everyone had used Accendia’s Information Transfer device, and now the group have knowledge of certain specialized Alteran sciences as well as key station codes. Dawn in particular had used her knowledge of mechanical science to awaken two of the servitors kept in Accendia’s servitor storage to prank a terrified Willow. The end result had been a four way screaming match with Dawn against Joyce, Buffy and an irritated Willow.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have passed Dawn knowledge of higher sciences.” Tain said with a frown as he sat opposite Xander taking his breakfast. “It seems that she’s still too immature to use her knowledge wisely.”

“I think Joyce will set her straight soon enough.” Xander said, turning to the doorway of the mess area, looking on as Joyce dragged a disgruntled Dawn back to their quarters on Accendia. “But just in case, I have utilized a change of codes in Accendia’s key systems, so that the more dangerous equipment on Accendia will be unusable by Dawn. I’ll pass the information to you, Ian and Yalen. Inform Giles and the others as well. Just… don’t hand Dawn any sensitive codes to the station for the time being. Not until she proves that she’ll be responsible with them.”

“I understand Xander.” Tain said with a nod. The rest of the group was beginning to fill into the mess area as Xander rubbed sleep from his eyes. “So what will be the plan now? Do we continue on our voyage in Enterprise and leave Accendia here for the moment?”

“Well… To be honest, even though I came here with the plan to repair Accendia, I never expected her to possess so many technologies and become so impressive after her repairs. She’s virtually self-sustaining. With many features and technologies I would never have imagined.” Xander said in amazement as he linked to Accendia, sensing her many systems running smoothly in the background. “The seven micro singularities powering her, will provide her with enough power to keep on functioning at maximum output for up to two centuries in optimal situations. We can virtually use her as a base of operations and launch all of our space efforts from here.”

“That seems like a sound idea.” Tain replied in a pondering voice. “With its powerful shields, it is easily defendable. Not to mention the numerous ships docked at its platforms.”

“The ships are considered part of Accendia, same as the original Lantean Al’kesh vessel back in Lauger’s workshop at my backyard on Earth.” Xander said as he chewed on his breakfast. “It basically meant that I can send them out to battle and repair any damages right here in the safety of Accendia, or for as long as I have physical contact with any of the ships that now make up Accendia. But the flaw is that any customizations I make to any part of the station or any of the ships will be erased once I begin repairs, since they are not part of Accendia’s original prime condition template, and will instead be considered damages done to Accendia.”

“If we ever need to customize any of the vessels, you can always do the same as what you’ve done with Enterprise.” Tain commented. “Buy a new ship and customize it. Return it to the building structure and get a new blueprint out of it.”

“That’s true.” Xander said as he thought. “The technologies of Accendia might be powerful, but it doesn’t have cloaking technology, and its shield technologies are less powerful and efficient than the Lantean version that Enterprise possessed. The ships in Accendia also use a form of faster than light that is vastly different from the Lanteans’ hyperspace travel. Both have its strength and flaws. What Enterprise lacks are the offensive technologies which Accendia can provide. Similarly Accendia can be upgraded with the Lantean technologies which Enterprise possesses.”

“Well… I will suggest that a group of us work on upgrading Accendia. Once Accendia is upgraded, you can get a new upgraded blueprint of the Accendia from it, deconstruct and reconstruct it.” Tain suggested. “Enterprise in the meantime can be upgraded, and a second copy of the Accendia be created. Since Accendia comes with its own ships, and any damage the ships sustain can be instantly repaired by placing wisps or other construction units within the station, you can continue your space voyage in the second Accendia’s ships and be reassured that the ships will be hard to destroy, what with the constant repairs done by the various construction units within the second Accendia.”

“That’s a good idea.” Xander said with a nod. “Accendia and most of its larger ships have an Alteran Gateway device in each of them. The device allows wormhole travel to another similar device anywhere within this galaxy or even further. The Gateway device is closely similar to our Way Gate structure except for the fact that it is smaller in size, utilizes wormhole energies and is more compact. It can be used to travel between ship and station. Earth also supposedly has two similar devices according to Lauger’s database. One was buried and the other was deactivated. If we can build a new Gateway device on Earth, we can return to Earth through the Alteran Gateway as well.”

“If that is the case, you should first build a second Accendia, and send a few of her ships out into space, towards the various locations you originally meant to go.” Tain commented. “Everyone can always travel onboard the departed ships through the Alteran Gateway devices. In the meantime, the knowledge you passed me of Accendia noted several large habitats in the station. We can always set up a Way Gate structure back to Earth so that we can get more people to help out. And with the Way Gate linking us back to Earth, there’s no need to build an Alteran Gateway device back on Earth.”

“We’ll have to make sure there’s sufficient security guarding the Way Gate structures linking Accendia and Earth together. And since the upgrades will be done on Accendia, we can make our home here straight away.” Xander agreed with a nod. “Other than that I see nothing wrong with your plan. Let’s work on that. I’ll tell the others later. We can begin moving our belongings into our quarters in Accendia, while I’ll contact the rest of the Order back on Earth and ask them who will be interested in helping set up the Order’s space headquarters.”

OoooO

Three hours later, in Accendia…

The commerce center of Accendia was majestic and beautiful. Filled with spiralling architectures, gardens, facilities, transport tubes leading to other parts of the station, and even an artificial sky. It was in fact a large hollowed area right in the center of Accendia where in ancient history, Alterans would gather and trade. It was also horrifyingly empty and silent, enough to send a shiver down Buffy’s spine as she walked down the silent streets of the city within Accendia.

Alteran transports of various design sat by the side of the streets as if begging to be used. With her new piloting knowledge and capabilities, Buffy was more than qualified to drive anyone of them. In fact the general knowledge of Accendia which the group had downloaded into their heads was more than enough to guide them in operating the vehicles.

For the moment though, Buffy was more than content to use her own two feet to explore the immediate surroundings of the city where she had made her residence. After Xander had revealed to the group of his intentions of staying on the station for a while, everyone had decided that it was best that they moved into the more comfortable accommodations available in Accendia’s city central. With the general knowledge of the station within their head, everyone knew Accendia’s inner structures quite well now. The station’s crew quarters were too utilitarian for prolonged usage.

The best apartments were located in the eastern part of the city, which according to Accendia’s records, were meant for usage by Alteran V.I.P.s. By an unspoken agreement, everyone moved into the same building block. Tain, Ian, Yalen and Xander had their own bachelors’ pad at the top floor of the apartment. Cordelia, Willow, and her own family took the apartment a floor below them. Jenny and Giles took the apartment unit right at the ground level.

Each of the apartment units in the block contained six living quarters, a large living room, a large storeroom and various other facilities such as the Alteran replicator unit and bathrooms, there was even a pool in each apartment. Three servitors were available in each apartment for any manual and maintenance tasks, and the first thing her mother did when they took over the apartments was to key the servitors directly to herself in order to pre-empt any mischief from Dawn in the future.

Even now, Buffy could hardly believe the knowledge, the technological powers and the luxuries that the group now possessed. Things were changing. The supernatural war between light and dark, good and evil was drawing to an end back on Earth. Pretty soon they might be launching themselves into the stars to go up against the evil in this galaxy. As Buffy wandered the empty streets lost in thoughts, she wondered… would she be ready?

OoooO

Five hours later, in Accendia…

Dawn sat beside the one of the Fountain of Mana Xander had set up around Accendia for the group’s magic users to use. This particular fountain was placed in the central park of Accendia’s city area, right where the Way Gate structure linking Accendia back to Earth was constructed.

A clan of Faerie Dragons now made the large park their home. Half the size of a human adult, they were beautiful and surprisingly lethal creatures. In a crowd, they had more than enough power to put down a few of their larger dragon cousins. The Faerie Dragons were the guardians in charge of protecting the Way Gate on Accendia. According to Xander, several Frost Wyrms guard the other side of the interlinked Way Gate back on Earth.

After Xander had told everyone of the change in plans, their belongings had been shifted from Enterprise to their new quarters on Accendia. Enterprise was sent for upgrading. A second Accendia had been constructed next to the original. A large number of the second Accendia’s Capital class ships, the largest ships attached to the station had been launched out into space, to various locations Xander meant to visit.

Only one hour ago, Tain had taken the first batch of Xander’s followers who had arrived through the Way Gate over to the eastern part of the city to settle them down. The once empty station now seemed much more lively.

Dawn in the meantime was watching the second batch of Xander’s followers coming in through the Way Gate. Most of them bore the symbol of a silver gauntlet fist, the symbol of the Order of the Silver hand. The Order was formed by Xander and all those that he created. Dawn wondered if her mom and sis were automatically considered members of the Order, or maybe they were just honoured guests.

“Hey Dawn, watching the newcomers?” Willow said as she sat down beside Dawn at the edge of the fountain. Dawn had already apologized to the red head hours ago for her prank in the morning. Willow had forgiven her, though her mother was still quite cross with her.

“Yeah and restoring my magic at the same time.” Dawn piped up excitedly. “A group of night elves just came through half an hour ago, Xander was leading them to the eastern habitat, the one that looks like a temperate forest filled with trees, I think they’re going to be settling down there.”

“There are four habitats in Accendia aren’t there?” Willow asked, pausing as she seemingly sorts through her memories. “Ah… I have found the info. We are now in Accendia’s city and commerce area which is close to 560 meters in width and length. Four large habitats surrounded the city from four different directions, each measuring around 120 meters, connected to each other via the transport tubes.”

“I know that Willow. We all have the general info in our heads.” Dawn said rolling her eyes before continuing with a grin. “And before the night elves came through, a clan of Pandaren Brewmasters came through. Ian brought them to the northern habitat, the one that looks like a large green plain with ponds and stone gardens, and let them set up their homes there.” Dawn said in a scandalized tone of voice. “I didn’t even know Xander had created so many non-human units in our world.”

“Xander’s followers, they are all people, genuine living beings.” Willow said, suddenly sounding stern. “Whether they are humans or non-humans shouldn’t matter understand Dawn? We should respect them. They are all loyal to Xander, that’s all that matters.”

“Ah… okay.” Dawn said, a bit cowed by the fierce glare Willow gave her.

Apparently seeing that Dawn understood what she meant, Willow relaxed as she smiled. “But Pandaren Brewmasters… If I remember correctly, they are the panda type Hero units from Warcraft III. They are very strong and versatile melee fighters. Xander probably needed their help when the Alliance was being set up.” Willow guessed as her lips curved into a smile. “Well… with all the different races in Accendia, life will certainly be different around here. I can’t wait to see what will happen in the next few days.”

The Way Gate before them suddenly activated as a large purple portal appeared at the top of the structure. Dawn sucked in her breath sharply as a group of creatures with a human top body, while the lower half looks like giant snakes slithered through.

“Naga Sea Witches.” Willow said, her eyes widening. “They are very powerful mystical Heroes with ranged abilities. But why did Xander need their help… of course, not all demons on Earth live on land… some made their homes in the oceans…”

“Teriánghan and clan.” Yalen said as he stepped into the park, stepping up to the Way Gate as the Naga Sea witches slithered down the stairs, each of them carrying bundles of belongings. A few in the group visibly possessed male bodies, and they carried most of the group’s load.

“Yalen.” The auburn haired female naga who was leading the group replied with a nod. “We have responded to the summons and came. I believe there’s an area where we can make our new home? The western habitat is it not? Xander had cluttered our heads with impossible sciences and technologies but he must have forgotten to pass us directions to our quarters itself. My head is so full of impossible things that I feel more like a goblin then a naga.”

“You will get used to it in time Teriánghan.” Yalen said with a laugh. “Xander meant to make the Naga clan scientists and engineers so you got most of the Alteran engineering and quantum sciences.”

Dawn felt her mouth dropped open as she watched Yalen led the nagas away, leaving behind two frozen girls.

“Well…” Willow seemed stunned as she got up from the fountain, breaking the silence after a few long minutes. “I should probably go and stake out one of the labs in Accendia. With the way things are going, this place might be filled before long.”

It took Dawn a few moments before her shocked mind processed Willow’s words. Then Dawn leapt from the edge of the fountain, running after Willow. “Wait Willow! I need to book my own lab too!”

OoooO

Four hours later, in Accendia…

The past few hours had whizzed by at a hectic run. With the formation of a new plan that was more in depth and solid then his previous idea of just blindly waltzing into space, Xander had sent out a call to see who among his Order wished to live in space for the next few months and contribute to setting up the Order’s base in space.

Within hours he had gotten numerous responses, and now twelve hours later, since the start of his new plans, he had more than two hundred people onboard Accendia, each with their own speciality in Alteran disciplines. A large part of Accendia’s engineer, medical and science teams are made up of the coalition of Human Archmages and Paladins, the Night Elves clan of Keepers of the Grove, Priestesses of the Moon, Wardens and Demon Hunters, the High Elves’ group of Blood Elves, the Orc clan of Blademasters and Far Seer, the Troll Shadow Hunters, the Goblin Tinkers and Alchemists, as well as the delegation of Naga Sea Witches.

The rest of the disciplines such as piloting, navigation, security, life support, etc. are handled by the Pandaren Brewmasters, Beastmasters, Tauren Chieftains, Mountain Kings and the various normal units of the Order. Though Xander pretty much leave the choice of what his followers will specialize in the future open, he had a sinking feeling that most would continue to stick to the disciplines that he had assigned them. He had spent a lot of time trying to break them of their blind loyalty to him, but so far he had only managed to get through to a handful of them. And even then, those rare few still treated him with the outmost respect.

Of course, with the formation of a new space base, Xander was able to shift a lot of his non-human followers away from Earth, where they would not have to spend their lives in hiding. He had needed a lot of their help during the setting up of the Alliance. Now at the very least, he could begin making things better for them. Of course, there were already plans back on Earth to create secret enclaves where his followers could live in peace, but he had a feeling some of his followers would still prefer the option of not hiding in a single location in a large world.

Close to ninety percent of the Order was still on Earth, maintaining the peace established by the Alliance, but the eleven percent of his followers on Accendia was more than enough to get him started on his plans.

The Order had helped him accomplish his goals, and thus he would fulfil his responsibilities to them, by one day locating and giving the human and non-human members of the Order a planet where they could call home. As for the protection of Earth and the Alliance, maybe in future he could make it a rotation duty among the members of the Order, with those fulfilling the duties being heavily compensated for them.

Even as he started planning, Xander had a feeling that not all in the Order would want to move away from Earth. Quite a lot of his human followers like living in the modern cities of Earth. Perhaps through them, he could further his plans for the supernatural world on Earth.

In the meantime, there was a station to upgrade, and more ancient Alteran sites from Lauger’s database to locate and explore… and hopefully, maybe even repair.

OoooO

Present time, in Accendia…

Matthew Scott looked through the windows of his new quarters in awe, seeing a view of a beautiful spawning city spread before him. As the first and most possibly only Earth human Hero unit within the Order, Matt always felt a sense of dislocation from most members of the Order. He did made several good friends within the Order, most belonging to the Los Angeles branch of the Order, but none of them had answered Xander’s call to venture out into space, to help in the construction of the Order’s space station base.

As a Hero Unit, Matt’s maxed out intellect scores was slightly below that of a Paladin, with much better agility stats. Running as fast as a speeding bullet was a fact of life to him now, if he was to push his speed to his limit, he could even break the sound barrier.

Perhaps it was the guilt he always felt Xander had towards him, but Matt was actually allowed a great deal of customization in the information he wanted Xander to transfer into his mind. Alteran piloting, navigation, and computational disciplines were now right at his fingertips.

The Paladin Tain, known in the Order as Xander’s right hand man, had been the one who guided Matt to his apartment, which was actually share by Xander, Tain, Ian and Yalen.

Accendia’s time zone had been set to match that of Earth’s Pacific time, marking the present time as an hour passed midnight. Having spent the whole day up, Matt was beginning to feel the weariness settling in. But the excitement of being out in space in a real space station filled with out of the world technologies was keeping Matt awake. Deciding at last to leave his room, he stepped into the living area of the apartment where he was surprised to find Xander decorating the area with pots of plants. Matt had not seen Xander much, aside from the few times back in the beginning after he was deconstructed and recreated by the teenager.

“Beautiful aren’t they?” Xander asked with a grin as he placed a glowing purple flowered plant on a glass table. “I got them off the replicator, though if we were to directly translate the Alteran name for the device, it’s called the Duplicator. But it sounds a bit weird, so everyone decided to stick with Star Trek naming conventions.”

“Patronis Blossoms.” Matt said as he eyed the plants, the general Alteran information Xander had given him instantly allows him to identify what they are. “They are a breed of plants brought by the Alterans from their original home galaxy into the Milky Way.”

“Yeah, I just thought this place needs some decorating, since I might end up staying here for quite a while.” Xander said before looking at Matt with a sigh. “I want to apologise to you Matt…”

“Stop.” Matt said holding up a hand. “After I was deconstructed and recreated by you, I met you for a total of four times before you went on your crusade against the supernatural world. And each of those four times you kept apologizing to me. I get it that you’re sorry for what happened, for taking away my free will, but there’s a limit as to how long you’ll keep feeling guilty over it when I already told you I’ve forgiven you.”

“Well, but…” Xander began but was quickly cut off by Matt.

“Yes my life changed from that moment on… but it was a good change, at the very least it was much better than the future which my ordinary self might have faced. I have powers now, incredible abilities, I am actually out in space here, with knowledge of alien sciences inside my head. I have to say that I’ve gotten the good end of the stick so far.” Matt said firmly. “So quit feeling sorry about the whole thing. It is starting to get old.”

Xander’s mouth opened and closed for a few times, as if he was lost for words. Then he began laughing. “I guess I needed that. Very well let me try again. I am Xander Harris, magical vampire extraordinaire, I’d like to be your friend instead of being your head honcho.”

“Deal.” Matt said with a smile as he shook hands with Xander. “And don’t be surprised if I give you a good hard rap to the head if you try to act emotional again.”

“Fine.” Xander said rolling his eyes. “By the way, I do have something to discuss with you and a few others. Maybe I’ll brief you now since you’re awake… I’ve been toying with plans to set up exploration teams. I’d like you to head one of those teams…”

OoooO

Ps. I am aware that in the shows, Stargates cannot open in close proximity of each other. That the Stargates/ Gateways can do otherwise in my story is due to Xander and group having direct access to Alteran knowledge. In the story, Xander’s group will have access to special access codes allowing Stargates to connect to each other even within planetary distances.

 

Matthew Scott is a character from Stargate Universe. Book 2 will utilize Alteran tech, as such it makes sense to me at least, to begin the Stargate cross with Stargate Universe… Remember that old rickety starship?