CHAPTER FOUR
Someone was pounding on the hotel room door. Ron shakily got to his feet, then made his way to the door. He opened it to find a frightened Dawn standing in the hall.
"Are you all right?" she asked. "I heard you scream."
"I think so," Ron said. "I'm not really sure."
Dawn guided him back to the bed despite his protests that he was feeling better now. She got him a glass of water and said, "So tell me what happened."
"It was weird," Ron said. "I felt like I was falling apart. But then it stopped."
"Definitely Hellmouthy," Dawn said, eyes wide. She grabbed his hand and pulled him off the bed and to the door. "Come on, Willow might know what it is."
"So, what is it, Professor?" Hermione asked, looking up into the distracted eyes of the Hogwarts Headmaster.
She glanced around at the others. Fred, George, and Ginny all looked eager to learn the answer. Ginny sat in a chair next to the bedside table while the twins sat on the bed. They were in Hermione's room in the Leaky Cauldron.
"It is a form of magic I have never before encountered," Dumbledore began. "I believe that it may not even be from this world."
"Where else would it come from?" Ginny asked.
"Why, elsewhere, of course," Dumbledore said, the twinkle returning to his eyes.
"Are Harry and Ron all right?" Hermione asked, voicing another question all of them had been thinking.
"There is no one of knowing that until the Aurors locate the sorcerer responsible.
"Sorcerer?" George repeated
"He's not a wizard?" Fred asked.
"No, I do not think he is, not in the way we perceive it," Dumbledore said. "Do not worry. I am certain that Mr. Weasley and Mr. Potter, wherever they are, are fully capable of taking care of themselves, as they have proved on multiple occasions."
"What can we do to help, Professor?" asked Hermione.
He smiled kindly at her. "I do believe that Flourish and Blotts have a number of books on archaic magic that I believe may be of use in locating a way to bring back Mr. Weasley and Mr. Potter in case we are unable to find the sorcerer."
The four teenagers exchanged glances. "We'll do what we can, Professor," Ginny promised.
"Yes, I'm sure you will," Dumbledore said.
SG-1's universe
"So, how exactly are we going to break into a top-secret government facility?" Andrew asked.
Everyone turned to Cordelia. She glared. "We're not," she said. "We're going to make a phone call to Colonel Jack O'Neill, then we're going to set up a meeting on our own turf."
"The hotel," Wesley said, nodding around at the lobby. The group stood in the Hyperion Hotel in Los Angeles, the office of Angel Investigations and the Scooby Gang's temporary headquarters.
Cordelia nodded.
"Now, when you said that the alternate Harriet's a guy-" Xander began, a smile forming on his lips.
From across the group from him, Harriet glared. "Xander-" she warned.
He continued, "What about Ronda and Hermes? Are they reversed, too?"
Cordelia shrugged. "I don't know. I just saw you and Harriet. Oh, by the way Xander, your alternate is missing an eye."
Everyone's eyes widened at that. "Missing an eye?" Buffy asked, shocked.
"What?" Xander questioned. "What do you mean? I'm some sort of Cyclops?"
Angel snorted. Xander glared at him.
"No, I mean you have an eye patch," Cordelia said in annoyance. "Can we please return to the phoning the colonel part of this conversation?"
"Do you know his phone number?" Giles asked. Cordelia shook her head.
"We can find it," Dawn volunteered, pointing between herself and Willow. Willow nodded and the women went to the space behind the reception desk where Willow's and Fred's laptops were set up.
"We'd better work on a few scenarios, just in case they bring back-up," Wesley said.
"With the manpower we've got, we should be able to handle it," said Gunn. "We've got a whole horde of Slayers upstairs, plus the rest of us. Whatever they throw at us, we can take."
"Unless they bring semi-automatics and surround and storm the entire hotel," Fred commented.
"Well, yeah, there's that," Gunn said a little sheepishly.
They spent many hours thinking of possible scenarios and what they would do for them. It took just as long for Willow and Dawn to track down Colonel Jack O'Neill's number. "You have got to see the security his workplace has," Willow said with a dreamy smile. "It's like, higher than state of the art. It's like, continent of the art."
"But you got the number?" queried Buffy.
Dawn smiled. "Oh, yeah."
Angel and Buffy locked gazes. "Then let's give him a call," Buffy said.
Harry, Teal'c, and Daniel stayed in the Commissary while Sam, Jack, and Xander went to Carter's lab to look up the names and addresses of the list of people Xander had in mind. Harry wished he'd gone with Xander. He knew the one-eyed man just as well as SG-1 and the rest of the people at the SGC, but he still felt more comfortable around him.
"So, you said that you were a wizard," Daniel prompted. "What exactly did you mean by that?"
Harry shrugged, shifting uneasily in his chair. "I can do spells."
"Magic does not exist, HarryPotter," Teal'c objected. "Are you certain it is not an advanced technology?"
"Oh, magic exists, all right. At least where I come from, it does. And yeah, I'm very sure that it isn't any sort of technology."
"Can you prove it?" Daniel asked.
"Only with my wand," Harry replied. "It focuses my magic, I think. A friend of mine explained it to me once but that was a while ago."
Meanwhile, Xander, Jack, and Sam had arrived at the science lab and had gotten settled. Sam sat in front of the computer with Xander sitting next to her in a folding chair. Jack leaned against the wall behind them.
Xander rubbed his hands together. "Okay, first person to check…Buffy Summers, Cleveland."
He gave her the address for the gym and hotel they used. Sam looked it up. After a few minutes, she shook her head. "The gym closed down two weeks ago."
"Okay, then. Maybe they're still in Sunnydale."
"Sunnydale, California?" Jack asked. When Xander nodded, he continued, "They're not. It was on the news in the Commissary. Sunnydale has become one big crater." The colonel frowned. "They said it was the result of some random earthquake."
"But you don't buy that," Xander surmised. "You shouldn't. That happened in my reality, too, but it was because the Hellmouth was being permanently closed."
"'Hellmouth'?" Carter repeated, quirking an eyebrow.
"Mystical portal that connects the world with one of many hell dimensions. Now that I know Sunnydale's been reduced to a crater in this world, but that it just happened, I know for certain that I've got a double here, and his name isn't Nicholas Brendon. There's only one place they can be right now, and that would be Angel Investigations, the Hyperion Hotel, Los Angeles."
Sam and Jack exchanged a glance that was full of a very loaded conversation. Despite both of their continued skepticism, they were beginning to believe Xander when he said that vampires, demons and magic existed. It was a scary thought that it might be present on their world as well and not just in an alternate reality. Although it would go a long way to explaining that temporal-distortion thing and what the 'warlock' had been doing to alter the Stargate's wormhole, assuming Carter's more logical explanation wasn't true. Jack wondered if Xander would know anything about the intruders.
Carter turned back to the screen and typed in the new information into the search engine. One click of the mouse and a link to Angel Investigation's web site came up in the results.
Xander smiled. "Bingo."
Jack came forward and leaned over Sam's other shoulder to view the web site. "Angel Investigations, Paranormal Investigations, We Help the Helpless," he read off the screen as an eyebrow went up.
"Cordy really did a good job on the site," commented Xander.
"You know these people?" Jack clarified.
"In my reality, yeah. Don't know what they're like here."
"We're going to find out. Carter, give me as much information on these people that you can," Jack ordered. "I'm going to see if they've tracked down pale-skin guy yet."
"Yes, sir," Carter said.
The Air Force colonel left. For a moment afterwards, they only noises in the lab were the click of the mouse and the tapping of keys. Carter glanced at Xander. Her gaze caught his and they smiled at each other.
"So…" Carter began.
"So…?" Xander prompted, lips quirking.
"About the demons in your reality. What do they look like?"
Xander lifted his eyebrows. "Scaling, oozing puss, horns, tails. There all sorts of demon breeds and types. It always varies from one to another."
"Why do you fight them?"
"'Cause if my friends and I don't, they'll likely take over the world or destroy it."
Carter's eyes widened. "Huh. Sounds like life around here, actually."
He smiled slightly.
For the next hour or so, Xander filled Carter in on the more formidable and weird-looking demons he'd encountered. As fantastic as it sounded, Sam couldn't help but compare it to her own life. Would she have believed half of the things that had happened to SG-1 before she was assigned to the SGC? Most likely she wouldn't.
Carter worked as she listened. Finally, she had all of the information she could find on this reality's Xander Harris and his group of friends. It wasn't much; most of their medical records and other things had been destroyed in the Sunnydale crater, but there was still enough information left that she felt would be satisfactory. She printed it all out and said, "I've got to get these to the General before we can call them."
"Okie dokie," he said, sighing. It had been a long day already and he felt nearly exhausted. According to Xander's watch, which had yet to be synchronized with the SGC's clocks, it was close to midnight. He'd been up since eight and he felt like he'd been awake for a solid week. "I guess portal traveling does that to you," he muttered.
"I'm sorry?" Sam questioned, pausing in gathering up the sheets of information.
"I'm just really tired. It's been a long day for me."
Carter just raised here eyebrows again. It was only midday for her, and it had been far from the most exciting day SG-1 had experienced. Then again, it could be much later in the day in Xander's reality.
"If you want, I could escort you to some guest quarters."
He waggled his eyebrows. "Will you be staying to keep me company, Major?"
She blushed even as she rolled her eyes. It had been a long time since she'd flirted with anyone.
"I never kiss on the first date," she said.
His eyebrows shot up in surprised. She fought down a smile. He looked really cute when he did that thing with his eyebrows…Down girl, she chided herself.
She smirked at him and headed for the door. "Come on."
"Ma'am, yes, ma'am!" Xander said smartly, snapping off a perfect salute while he was at it. Sam just rolled her eyes.
Xander grinned goofily as he lowered his arm. Sam felt herself go weak in the knees. Damn, but does he have to do that so often? she internally whined.
Almost as if he read her mind, the smile fell to be replaced by a frown. The frown quickly shifted to one of shock and then panic.
Carter reached out and grabbed his arms just as he began to sink to the floor. He gasped like a fish out of water. Sam had a feeling she knew what this was and cursed herself for not remembering it sooner. Xander's body rippled like the reflection on a pool's surface. Sam gulped. She'd this happened only a few times before, and then it had happened to alternate version of herself.
It was over within seconds. Xander gasped, trying to catch his breath. Sam helped him over to the chairs. "Crap," he said finally. "That's that Entropic Whatcha-ma-call-it, right?"
She nodded. "Entropic cascade failure." She winced and looked him over. He looked pale, and he held a hand over his heart. "Come on, let's get you to the infirmary."
He didn't even attempt to protest as she helped him back onto his feet and out the door, headed in the direction of the infirmary.
Willow frowned as she listened to the explanation Ron gave of what had happened to him. It was the next morning, and she, Kennedy, Dawn, Buffy, and Ron stood in a corner of the dining room, filling Buffy and Kennedy in on what had happened to Ron the night before. Many of the Slayers-in-Training already awake listened in from various parts of the room.
"It sounds like some sort of cross-dimensional magical effect," Willow said, trying to find the right words to describe what she was thinking. "Like, there's a double of you in England, only he'd not you, he's Rupert Grint, but it still applies. This reality knows you don't belong here and is sending a warning to you to go back."
"What'll happen to him if it keeps happening?" Dawn said.
Willow shrugged. "I don't know. I'm just guessing, but I'd bet that you could die if you stayed here too long."
Ron groaned. "Great, just bloody great."
"Don't worry," Buffy assured him. "We'll find a way of getting you back to your reality, no sweat. In fact, I was just going to go on patrol with Kennedy and Willow. You and Dawn want to come with?"
Ron glanced at Dawn, who looked eager. He turned back to Buffy and shrugged, hoping he wasn't going to regret it. "Okay."
"Great," Buffy said, smiling. "Let's go grab some weapons and meet in the lobby in ten minutes. We're going back to the place the warlock was at the last time to see if he left any clues."
"No need," Kennedy said. She was staring out the door at the hotel lobby. "Look."
Everyone turned to look and saw a team of four Slayers-in-Training dragging a fifth figure through the front doors. "That's him!" Ron said.
Buffy led their little group over to the Slayers. "Good work, girls," she praised them. "Let's take him to the side room. Next time, be sure to go through the gym."
The side room was a little room just off the entrance hall of the gym. It had been a weight room once upon a time; now it was used to hold creatures of the night if any were caught trying to sneak into the building. It was also there in case one of the good guys got bit by a werewolf and needed a place to be locked up for three nights a month. It had never been used for either use before, but there were a few chairs, some chains, and some sturdy rope stacked inside for such occasions.
They dragged the sorcerer into the side room and tied him up to one of the chairs. "You got a name?" Buffy asked after he'd been secured. She, Kennedy, Willow, Ron, and Dawn were the only ones in the room besides the sorcerer, but from the noise outside there was a crowded of Slayers gathering in the hall.
His glowing green eyes were wide in panic and fear. "Please don't hurt me!" he pleaded. "I didn't mean any harm, please-"
"No harm?" Dawn demanded, furious. "You sent Xander through your portal and brought Ron here!"
"It was an accident!" he said, glancing at the redhead wizard. His eyes turned back to Buffy. "If you and your friend hadn't interrupted, both of you would be here, safe."
Furious, Buffy stalked forward and grabbed his collar. She pulled him to within inches of his face. He cringed.
She nearly hissed, "You had six Ti'ippa Demons working for you. If you hadn't wanted trouble, you shouldn't have had guards that liked to eat children!"
His eyes widened in further, this time in surprise. "I-I hadn't known. I simply wanted a guard, I had no idea that they liked to eat the children of your species."
"You should have run a background check," Kennedy said.
"Why did you have the guard in the first place?" Ron asked, curious. "If you didn't mean any harm like you said."
The sorcerer laughed hysterically. "Go unprotected on the Hellmouth while I was performing such exotic magic? I am not stupid. However, I never predicted that a Slayer would show up right at the crux of my spell."
He gave them all a pleading look. " I had no wrong intentions towards any of you. I had simply wanted to go home to my own dimension. Please believe me."
Buffy and the others exchanged glances. "All right," the alpha Slayer said, "so you wanted to go home and you ended up sending Xander there instead and sent Ron here. Where did you send Xander and Ron's friend, Harry?"
The sorcerer glanced away from them and seemed to be in deep thought. "I am not sure. They couldn't have possibly have gone to my own dimension-perhaps to one of the others…"
"What others?" Willow questioned. "You'd better start explaining, pal."
His eyes widened in panic and he nodded enthusiastically. "Yes, yes, of course! It is the least I owe you. Please, I will tell you, but will you first untie these ropes? I have very sensitive skin…"
"Start talking, then we'll talk about cutting you loose," Buffy said.
"As you wish." He licked his lips and began. "My name is Trig, and I come from a world known as Runeus. The magic there is…very different."
"Kinda guessed that," Kennedy said, raising an eyebrow. "Keep going."
"I was stranded on this world four years ago, when I portal appeared on my world. Bolts of energy struck out from the edges of this portal, striking against buildings and people. I was one of those struck. I know not what happened to the others who were attacked, but I found myself shot through the portal."
"Something…strange happened then. I am not certain how to describe it. As I floated within the very center of the portal, I saw glimpses into hundreds of worlds, perhaps even thousands, some as rich and unique as this one is to my own, and others that were wastelands crawling with disgusting creatures. Something happened to me as I traveled through the portal. I felt myself being ripped apart, yet I was still alive. I think that aspects of me were separated into different bodies, and these different aspects were then shipped off to different worlds. I am only an aspect of myself, and I was sent to this one. I found myself in a town in California, the one that a year or so ago became a crater. I have been looking for a way to get back home and re-unite with the other parts of myself ever since."
"I knew some of the magic from my own world, and did research into the magic of this one. I soon learned, however, that this world's magic was not compatible with my own, and I could not perform even the simplest spells using your magic. I knew very little about my own magic, but I determined that with some creative manipulation that I would come up with a portal spell that would send me home. Once I was back in my homeland, I knew that I would have a better chance of finding my other selves, if they themselves have not returned already."
His eyes pleaded with them once more. "Please, my only ambition is to re-unite with my other parts."
"And then what?" Buffy asked with a raised eyebrow. "How do you plan on putting yourself back together?"
He shrugged. "That is something I planned to focus on when the time came."
"So where's Xander?" Willow asked.
"And Harry?" Ron added. "And how did I get sent here?"
"I cannot be certain, but perhaps another of my aspects performed the spell at the same time as I did. If that happened, then the two portal spells would interact with each other, making it more likely that whatever is sent through the portals will end up in one of the other worlds where the spell is being performed instead of on Runeus."
"Of course," Willow said in understanding. When everyone looked at her, she clarified, "That makes sense, the whole portal-spells-interacting-with-one-another bit."
"How do we get our friends back?" Buffy demanded again.
"The only one I can see is for me to perform the spell again, which I planned to do anyway. The only time this can be done is at 10:12 PM precisely."
"Why then?" Dawn asked.
"It is the time when this world and my own are in the closest alignment. As soon as we are on my world, we can find a way of opening a portal to wherever your friends are."
Buffy motioned for all of them to leave the room except Kennedy who stayed behind to keep an eye on their guest. The rest of them went upstairs to Buffy's office. Once inside, Buffy turned to the resident witch. "What do you think, Wills?"
Willow considered everything he'd said. "He was telling the truth. I cast a truth spell like you asked me to. He believed everything he was saying."
"So we're going to trust him?" Dawn asked.
"Do we have any other options?" Buffy replied.
"I don't know if I like the idea of trusting a demon," Ron said. "Especially not the one that caused all of this in the first place, even if he is telling the truth."
"I hear you," Buffy told him, "But we don't have a whole lot of choices at the moment. So we'll let him perform the spell, but Willow, I want you to be on your guard in case he tries anything. The rest of us need to be on our guards, too."
Everyone nodded, then got themselves ready before going to speak to the sorcerer again. Ron fingered his wand as they headed back downstairs. He, along with everyone else, hoped that the sorcerer could be trusted.
Kingsley Shacklebolt and Nymphadora Tonks walked cautiously up to the house. The old, pealing paint-covered house was in a bad Muggle neighborhood on the outskirts of London. It was thirty blocks from Diagon Alley and was only one of a hundred places that the Aurors were checking out, but they still took every precaution they could. It wouldn't do to be caught unawares by a sorcerer of unknown skill.
Because it was a Muggle neighborhood, the two of them were dressed in Muggle clothes. Anyone who saw them would think, in the words of Fred and George, that they would 'be sneaking inside for a quickie,' whatever that rather ridiculous-sounding Muggle phrasing meant.
They walked up the front steps. To her credit, Tonks managed not to trip on them, although she came close once. Shacklebolt knocked on the door. They waited. No one answered. Tonks looked around to make sure no one was looking. When she signaled the all-clear, Shacklebolt took out his wand and whispered, "Alohomora." There was a click as the lock clicked open. He opened the door and Tonks followed him inside.
The house wasn't much to look at. The paint was pealing from the inside walls as well, but it had obviously been cleaned recently; there weren't any spider webs about and only a light sheen of dust was present on the furniture and bare-wood floors.
The door creaked and the floor squeaked as they edged their way inside. Tonks took out her wand. Shacklebolt signaled for her to stay with him as he edged his way down the hall and past the stairs. Both of them had a feeling about this one and knew that it had to be the place.
Everything was silent, perhaps a little too silent. Tonks whispered a revealing spell and discovered why. There was magic everywhere, magic that clashed with hers. The revealing spell couldn't identify what spells that magic was performing, but she could see it as her spell settled on patches of it floating everywhere.
"Dampeners, perhaps?" Shacklebolt wondered, glancing around at the patches.
"Sound Dampeners, you mean?" Tonks guessed, trying to understand what he was getting at.
He nodded. "Yes. Exactly."
"There's no way of telling," Tonks said, although she had a feeling that he was right.
They walked up to the first door and positioned themselves on either side of it. Shacklebolt reached out and grasped the handle before turning it and slowly pushing the door in.
Sunlight streamed in from a window. No one was inside.
He closed the door and they proceeded to the next one, taking up the same positions on either side of it.
This time, when Shacklebolt opened the door, Tonks had an urge to cover her ears and automatically shrunk them. Whatever was going on in this room, the Dampeners had done well to conceal the horrendous noise coming from it. It sounded like there was a miniature tornado inside.
The two Aurors stormed into the room with wands up. Even after Hermione's description of what had occurred the last time, neither of them were prepared for what they saw. A portal identical to the one Hermione had seen stretched from floor to ceiling to walls at one end of the room. The sorcerer knelt before it, partially facing them. A bowl identical to the first one lay at his knees, and he held his bleeding hand above it. Symbols carved into the knife's wooden handle matched those on the rim of the bowl.
He ceased his chanting when they entered the room. For a moment, they just stared at each other, unmoving. The moment was broken the sorcerer let out a cry of frustrated rage. "You will not interfere again!" he cried, leaping to his feet, careful not to spill the blood. He dropped the knife into the bowl and reach into his pockets, taking out two wooden blocks carved with identical symbols.
"Stupefy!" both Aurors cried, reacting to the perceived threat.
The magical curses left their wands in a flurry of color, shouting straight at the pale sorcerer.
The sorcerer's glowing eyes flashed as the spells drew closer. He brought his arms up and pressed the two wooden blocks together, symbol aligned with symbol.
The Aurors' spells impacted with a magical field that sprang into the air from the wooden blocks. The Stupefy spells rebounded, heading directly back in the direction of their casters. With a cry, the Aurors ducked out of the way.
The sorcerer pulled his arms in toward his chest, then pushed outward, crying out a word in an unknown language.
The magical barrier produced by the wooden blocks sprang out from the blocks and at the Aurors. It rolled right over them, knocking them off their feet and leaving them dazed.
For a moment, Tonks' mind was blank. She blinked and awareness returned. She tried to move but couldn't do so very successfully, almost as if she lay under something thick and heavy that impeded all of her motions. Shacklebolt has having similar problems with his own limbs.
The sorcerer turned away from them and knelt down before the bowl. He picked up the knife and pierced his skin even deeper than before, drawing more blood, before he resumed the chant.
The portal changed colors rapidly, from dark blue to royal blue to light blue to an almost grayish color. Tonks and Shacklebolt were slowly regaining control of their limbs and were trying to sit up.
The sorcerer stopped chanting and stood. Taking the bowl in one hand and the knife in another, he walked toward the portal.
Tonks struggled to stand and bring her wand up. "No! Stop!" she cried.
He ignored her and walked into the portal, disappearing from their world.
A moment later, as the Aurors were getting to their feet, the portal closed.
When Harry collapsed in the Commissary from Entropic Cascade Failure on the Cellular Level, Daniel and Teal'c led him to the Infirmary and got there at about the same time as Xander and Sam. Janet had both boys placed in bed as she and her medical staff checked them over.
"What was that?" Harry asked. "Teal'c and Dr. Jackson said something about Entropic Cascade Failure?"
Xander explained, "It's what happens to someone from another universe when their double is alive in this one. We've both got doubles here, so the universe doesn't think there should be two of us. If we don't get home soon, we'll both be wiped from existence."
Harry's eyes widened and he paled considerably.
Before he could say anything, Colonel O'Neill walked in. "Hey, kids," he said, addressing all of them at large. "How're the patients, doc?"
"All right for now, but if they suffer from another Cascade Failure, they won't be," Janet said.
"Have you found our guy yet, Colonel?" Xander asked.
"Nope, but interestingly enough, I did get a call from your friends," Jack said, nodding to Xander. He held up his cell phone. "Just checked my voice mail. There was a message from a Cordelia Chase on it, asking to meet with you two in Los Angeles. The General's already okayed it. SG-1 and our two guests are going to take a little trip to the City of Angels."
