Training Daze, A Crossover Fanfic of the Dresden Files

By Ellf
Chapter Twelve

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the intellectual property found within this fanfic. All belong to their respective content creators. Dresden Files is authored by Jim Butcher, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a creation of Joss Whedon.

I left the Wardens, Murph, and Butters at the Burger King so I could do some independent research and talk with my source, or at least that's what I told them. I needed to get a handle on what happened to me, and the only time I'd had to myself since waking up was the limited amount of time I had in the bathroom and bedroom respectively. Well, there was the little bit in the Loaner, but given that Lasciel's shadow had shown up, I wouldn't really count that as proper alone time. I needed to be able to think about what happened and adjust.

I also needed to see what Bob had to say. Bob should have returned home from the time out that I'd given him, but he and my brother had to be wondering why I hadn't come back in two days. Given that Murphy had some sort of idea, I was assuming that Butters also called Thomas to give him an update on what had happened to me, but I probably stayed at his place because of the Wardens. I was none too confident about what would be said if any of the Wardens found out about Thomas, and that he was staying with me. This was one of the reasons I didn't invite any of them back with me, along with needing some alone time.

Thomas being a vampire of the White Court would be an issue, of course. There'd be a lot that the wrong people could do with that information. They could assume that Thomas had me compromised, they could assume that I was a pawn of the White Court, active in the White Council. This assumption would come while we remained at war with the Red Court, of course. However, the worst thing they could assume is that our relationship was the truth, and then they'd try to make me use it. I wouldn't do that to my brother.

I parked the Loaner on my street and looked up in the mirror, brushing some reddish bangs out of the front of my face. Funny. I'd spent the bulk of the time driving focused on anything but my current situation. Of course, given what I'd decided at Butters's place, there really wasn't a hell of a lot that I could do at the moment more than what I was already doing. I was stuck as my current gender unless Bob had an out that didn't involve… Well, anything that I'd have to do something horrible to do. I could live with being a woman if I had to. Fifty percent of the population were women, and they managed just fine. It'd just be nice to be myself again if it was possible.

Shaking my head, then brushing my hair back behind my ear afterward, I stepped out of the Loaner and headed toward my apartment. It looked like Thomas had done the shoveling while I was gone, and he'd even shoveled the walk around the building for Mrs. Spunkelcrief and the Willoughbys. I'd have to thank him for doing so as I wasn't entirely sure I'd be up for it with my new arms. I'd need to check how strong I was later, but I knew that I had to be at least somewhat weaker just due to smaller muscles. Didn't matter though. I'd figure it out.

I descended the steps to my apartment and extended my left hand, letting the familiar tingle of my wards pass through me. I flipped the metaphysical switch that would let me pass through them unharmed and I moved to unlock the front door. I most definitely did not frown at the door's steel frame, but I shoved at it a few times before I got it open enough to wiggle through.

I was greeted at the door by Mister, who took a look at me for half a second before imperiously deciding to do his usual greeting with my shins. However, he ended up rubbing against them afterward, and it felt soft and nice through the material my new pants were made out of.

Mouse walked over from his position in the living room and looked me over. He approached closer and started to sniff at me, taking in my scent. I smiled at my dog, who now came up to just below my shoulders, and he chuffed in greeting, holding out a paw. I took it and Mouse chuffed again, holding out his tongue as I shook it.

"Good boy," I whispered.

"Oh, Harry, is that you?" Thomas's voice rang from the kitchen, and I just noticed the smell of pizza wafting through the apartment. Stars and stones, he'd been out every other time I'd been here the past few days, why'd he have to be here now?

Well, it was now or never. "Yeah, Thomas, it's me…"

I stepped further into the apartment, toward the living room, just as my brother placed the pizza on top of the stove. Thomas wasn't wearing a shirt, just a pair of tight blue jeans that hugged his body in a way that showed off exactly how well built my brother was. My brother's shoulder-length dark hair was currently tied back into a ponytail, and his bluish-gray eyes flicked over at me. My brother had one of those bodies that could have been used to sculpt the gods, and he didn't even work out. Came from being a vampire.

Thomas approached me and I could feel my heart start beating faster as I saw silver flecks go into his eyes. See, I knew consciously how attractive my brother was to women and some men. I'd seen it before, what he can do to them with a glance. How he gets their blood pumping, their bodies ready. It was all a part of the sexual predator that he was. Hell, the rest of his family was no different. I'd been on the receiving end of a come-hither from Thomas's sister, Lara, and that was… hoo boy… very strong. But having experienced that and knowing what it looked like didn't exactly prepare me for what was coming from Thomas other than in an intellectual sense. My body really didn't seem to like the intellectual sense.

I stepped toward the man in front of me, my brother, and I watched as he reached out his arms toward me. Man, I really wanted to be in those arms. I just… No, this was wrong. I wasn't normally attracted to men of any sort, but Thomas was something else. He wasn't just a man… He was—

A low growl interrupted my thoughts as Mouse moved between Thomas and I. My brother blinked a couple times and the silver faded away from his gaze. I locked eyes with him as I pulled out my blasting rod and placed it on the coffee table.

"Thomas, I'm going to ask you once," I said, shuddering. It wasn't so much the attraction to a man that had me reeling as much as the fact that Thomas was my brother. I mean, I knew that Lord Raith had done something similar to Thomas's sisters, but… just ugh. If I was going to go for any man, it wouldn't be my brother, not that I wanted to go for men in the first place. "Please never do that again."

"Empty night," Thomas cursed. "It really is you, isn't it Harry?" He turned to… Well, I'm not really sure, because I instinctively held up a hand, and he ended up crashing into a wall of force. Okay, I wasn't entirely sure where that came from, but I wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth

"Now, don't go and do your broodypants thing, mister," I said. "Not when I need to talk with you."

"Broodypants?" Thomas snorted, rubbing his arm from where he bumped it, and he seemed to calm down a little. Good. I didn't want him to think that I held the come-hither against him. I knew it was his Hunger, not really his choice, but he'd had pretty good control to pull it back, with the help of Mouse. "That's an interesting turn of phrase."

"Yeah, I'm full of them." I slipped my duster off and hung it on the coat hanger near the doorway before making my way back to the couch and sitting down. I gave an idle glance to the item in my umbrella stand and frowned. Another mystery to add to the growing pile. Mouse sidled up next to me and laid his head in my lap. I started scratching him behind his ears. I hoped he wouldn't a

"So, you're definitely Harry then," Thomas said, walking over to sit on another couch and look at me in the candlelight. "I suppose I can see it. You look a little like Mom did in our soulgaze. Though I'm not entirely sure why the red highlights."

"They're natural, as far as I can tell," I said idly… and then my face heated up as I realized what I implied. "I mean, not that I've really looked to tell for certain. But given how I got them, they're probably natural…"

"Okay, I think you're going to have to tell me what happened," Thomas said.

So I did. I told him about what had happened since the start of the case, the Janus ritual, the deaths, the trip to Sunnydale in Willow Rosenberg's body, the meeting of Warden Chase and Tara, the mentioning of Glorificus…

"Wait. You're sure she said Glorificus?" Thomas asked.

I nodded. "Definitely. She said that this person was supposed to be dead."

"Well, given that Tara's supposed to be dead too," Thomas mused. "Glory being alive wouldn't be out of the question."

"Okay, so who's Glory?" I asked. "And wait… You're saying Tara's from Sunnydale as well?"

"Willow Rosenberg's girlfriend from Season 4 until Season 6, when she was shot and killed. Of course, this Tara could be just a girl named Tara, but given that she recognized Glory, I'm going to say that's probably not the case." Thomas scratched his chin a little. "And Glory… She's a Hell Goddess. I'm not sure how that translates to actual power here, but she was faster and stronger than Buffy. She also had the ability to drain the sanity out of people by sticking her fingers into their minds."

I shivered, and Mouse moved closer, to put his warm furry body near me. Good dog. Still. A Hell Goddess. That really didn't sound like anything that I wanted to be tangling with… so of course, I was going to be the one tangling with it. Face it, Dresden, you were in this from the moment you spoke with Tara the second time.

"The whole fictional character thing throws me off a little," I admitted.

"And the body doesn't?" Thomas asked.

"It'd do so less if I were taller," I said. "The Council's doing research on seeing if they can help me get back my old self, and they'll probably do some paperwork if I can't."

"That sucks."

"Yeah," I agreed. "But maybe Bob might be able to find something."

"That skull?" Thomas asked. "He'll probably ask you to flash him first."

"He does, and I'll threaten to smash the skull. It's how we bond," I smiled sweetly at my brother. "Still, Bob's a spirit of knowledge. There's probably not much about magic that he doesn't actually know, as long as it's not tied up in those memories I asked him never to access again. Kemmler did one hell of a number on him."

"Right," Thomas said, and then he looked a little thoughtful. "So, when I turned to walk away, what did you do, Harry? I didn't hear you cast a spell."

"I'm… not sure, really," I admitted. "I just didn't want you to leave yet."

"And I slammed into an invisible wall. Maybe Willow had more of an effect on you than the body," Thomas said, standing. "Though I do have to ask, what was Sunnydale like?"

"Warm, mostly. Little hectic with whatever was causing the chaos," I admitted.

"Suppose it would be, that." Thomas scratched his chin. "Wait, didn't you say Tara mentioned something else other than Glorificus?"

"The… Oh. Hell's bells…."

"What?"

"The four glowing eyes. Michael and Sanya being back in town. Glory's working with a Denarian." I stood up sharply and started for my basement. "I really need to talk to Bob."

The idea of the Denarians back in Chicago made my palm itch as I descended the stepladder into my subbasement. Sure, my left hand was no longer burned, a lovely silver lining to the current situation I found myself in, but that didn't change the thing that had saved my palm. I still had that connection to the coin buried under my basement, covered in cement, and until I found a way to break it, I'd have it up until then.

I looked at my slowly growing model and shook my head. I needed more than that tonight. Still, I wasn't sure how much I was looking forward to this. He might have been a spirit of intellect and had umpteen amounts of knowledge to him, but he was… well… He had his quirks. Quirks that I'd probably come to regret by the time the night was finished, but nonetheless, I'd relied on him in the past and needed him now.

I just hoped he'd answer me.

I glanced to the bleached skull that sat atop the bookshelf in my lab, and said, "Up and at 'em, Bob. We've got work to do."

Orange lights flickered to life inside the skull, and, after making an overly elaborate yawning sound as the skull opened in a parody of the yawn, the skull turned toward me. "Harry? Is that you?"

"Mostly," I said, looking to Bob, and waiting for his inevitable reaction.

"Oh, Harry, this is the nicest gift you could have given me!" Bob sounded positively gleeful. "Learning how to transform yourself into a woman, and then coming down here and showing me..."

"Not helping, Bob." I crossed my arms under my chest and gave the skull a look. "Don't suppose you know a way to fix this?"

"Why would you want to?" Bob asked. "You're young, you're attractive. Why, I bet you'll get even more lucky as you are now than you ever did as a man."

"Not the point," I said, my teeth gritted, and then I let out a small sigh. While it'd be nice to change back, it wasn't the most pressing thing on my plate at the moment. Still, I needed to ask again. "Can you help me change back or not?"

"Mmm… I'm not sure, Sahib. Pardon. Memsahib."

"Let's go with the male pronouns unless I say otherwise, okay?" I suggested to the skull.

"Very well, boss. You said fix it. Meaning you didn't transfigure yourself willingly?" Bob asked, and I shook my head. "Do you have any idea what might have caused it?"

I gave the skull a brief summary of what had happened in Sunnydale along with what I'd felt in the lead-up to it. Then, elaborating on that, I told him about Warden Chase's origins. Cordelia and Tara both were clues as to what had happened to me, even if neither of them was directly responsible. I even let him know about the soulgaze I'd shared with Injun Joe to confirm my identity as myself. Of course, I didn't tell him the specifics about what I'd saw, but Bob needed to know everything I could let him know in order to help.

"So the Senior Council member didn't know what to make of it?" Bob asked.

"No, Injun Joe said he'd need to look into a few things, and from what I've heard, he's one of the best healers and shapeshifters the Council has to offer."

"Right, let me take a closer look," Bob said. "Just put me down on the table, somewhere around where Sears Tower will be when you finish it."

I nodded and walked over to Bob's shelf, reaching upward, and then I frowned as my arms barely fell short of the top of the shelf. I wasn't used to being this short. I might have still been taller than Murphy, but that didn't mean I could reach Bob at the top. No, I needed to find something else I could use to help me get up to him. Ah, there. I hadn't needed to do this since before puberty. I pulled a chair over to the shelf and climbed atop it, carefully grabbing Bob's skull off, holding him facing away from me, and I stepped down off the chair.

"Well, Sahib, your hands are nice and soft now," Bob said. "I noted no glove there, and your hand doesn't quite look like a burned husk."

I placed him down on what would be my model of Chicago when I finished it, and the skull turned to look me over with his orange lights. "Well?"

"Easy now, I'm taking a look," Bob said, looking me over. "Mmm… It might be better if you were to take your top off. I'd be able to see more."

I crossed my arms again and gave the skull a look.

"Well, you certainly have that disapproving look down, Sahib." Bob gave another look over me, orange light passing over my body, and he let out a low whistle. Which, given that he was a skull, was something of a novelty. "Yes, okay. That's… well… I haven't seen something like this before."

Okay. That was… strange. "What do you mean?"

"Well, there's a duality to you now," Bob said. "You're still you, but you've got some extra bits in there that aren't originally from you but are now integrating. The physical change might be a part of that, or it might be a result of the original ritual that pulled you to Sunnydale, California in the first place."

"Okay, so does that mean I can change back?"

"Possibly, but it would take some time and you would need to find out the exact ritual that initialized your change in the first place." Bob made a considering sound. "Of course, that's for a permanent return."

I gestured for him to go on.

"It might be possible for you to use your duality and retake your male form," Bob said. "It's not like such a thing hasn't been done before by other wizards. Self-transfiguration isn't impossible, nor is it against your mortal Laws of magic."

"Yes, but it's easy to screw up," I said. "Doing it wrong could leave me a pile of goo."

"Which is why you should just stay the way you are." Bob's eyes practically twinkled in the sockets of the skull. "I am looking out for your best interest, Sahib."

"Yeah, and you want a girl to ogle." I shook my head. "Anyway, current form aside, we do still have a murderer, whatever created that schizofiend, and a twofer of a Denarian and a hell goddess to worry about."

"And they're all probably linked to your current form," Bob said, somehow pulling off a sage nod despite not having the leverage. I've long since inured myself to his movement-based antics. "Sunnydale too, it seems, with both Chase, Tara and this Glorificus."

"So, what do you know about hell gods?"

"Not much more than you do, Harry," Bob said, and I could tell that the idea was subtly irking him about as much as it excited him. After all, how often did a Spirit of Intellect run into information that he didn't know yet? Still, it bothered me. The murders, the schizofiend, my change, and even my time in Sunnydale. It didn't add up. Why murder Lisa Hendricks? Unless she wasn't the main target.

I doubted the bodies were there simply to fuel the ritual, at least not the way they had been killed. If they were, the killer would have used something more traditional to chop them apart and wouldn't have used magic to glue them back together. While the deaths spoke to a duality, they also spoke of purpose. The symbolism was stronger than I'd expect for an average ritual, which obviously meant that the ritual was beyond what I'd expected. I'd need more information about the victims, which of course meant speaking to some people.

"Well, maybe you can break down for me what you do know," I said, looking to Bob.

"Okay, Boss." The skull seemed to smirk. "Of course, just because I don't know much more than you doesn't mean that I don't know more than you. You are, after all, a bit thick about things. So, when it comes to gods, let me do a refresher."

"Bob," I said in a voice as low as I could make it, only to be answered by a chuckle from the skull.

"That's adorable, Harry," Bob said. "But more seriously, most gods and other deities are beings that reside in the Nevernever, under their own dominions, separate from Faerie. Sometimes they intermingle, and other times they don't. Back when you mortals were still banging rocks together, before the White God did His whole little I AM bit, gods were popular everywhere, getting their power from their worshippers and gaining influence on the world."

"Right, and sometimes the gods don't have as many worshippers anymore, but with the right ritual, they can be contacted and power can be requested from them."

"Just like a vending machine," Bob said. "But the difference is, those gods have power constraints keeping them from interfering without worshippers. Of course, the term worshipper is fairly loose. I'm sure there are gods walking around the material realm among you. They're probably taking jobs that they can get a lot of people watching them and cheering them on."

"What, like movie stars or athletes?" I asked.

"You can't deny that Angelina Jolie is like Aphrodite," Bob said with a leer. "Of course, your new form is almost better."

"Let's move away from that. Glorificus isn't like that," I said, redirecting the subject. Why did my perverted spirit of intellect hav eto perv on me?

"No, she isn't, but she comes from another reality, much like the version of Sunnydale that you were sent to."

"Okay, so does that mean she's from Outside?" I asked, worrying about the Seventh Law a bit.

"Not precisely, but the Hellish aspects of the Nevernever do tend to be closer to the Outer Gates. If her backstory is like the show, than she comes from an area of the Nevernever that she ruled alongside others. In all likelihood, her physical manifestation isn't fully stable, since she has no worshippers here."

"Explains the brain sucking," I said. "Makes me wonder how she even got here."

"That I can't tell you, Sahib. Maybe your little brain buddy might be able to," Bob responded.

"I've asked the Shadow already, and she doesn't seem to know. Apparently the real thing avoided alternate realities."

"Interesting." Whatever else Bob was going to say was cut off as the phone rang. I heard my brother answer the phone.

After a few seconds, his voice echoed out. "Harry, it's Murphy. She wants to talk to you."

"We'll continue this conversation later, Bob," I said as I headed up the stepladder. "I'll need you to do some things for me in a bit."

"Yes ma'am," Bob said cheekily, and his eyes winked out. I shook my head and made my way through the trapdoor separating my subbasement from my basement apartment.

My brother held the phone out toward me, and I forced down more feelings of unnatural origin as I walked by him. He probably was a little hungry, and that was something I really didn't want to have to deal with. I took the phone from him and leaned against the wall.

"Hello?" I said, making it almost a question.

"Harry?" Murphy replied.

"No, I'm his little sister, but I can take a message," I said with a smirk to my voice.

"Dresden, times are serious," Murphy said.

"Yeah, I know. I've lost a foot in height." I shook my head. "What's up Murph?"

"Well, I went to check in on the Astor family to see if I could talk with Faith," she said, her voice clearly building up to something.

"And? But?" I urged her to go on.

"Her parents haven't seen her in three months," Murphy said. A lump formed in my stomach. Faith Astor had been my first major case that involved the police. Finding that girl and dealing with the troll that we'd inadvertently run into also was how I met Murphy. Of course, her parents tried to blame Nick Christian and I for her running away, saying we kidnapped her, but she set the police straight. "They said she disappeared around Halloween, and she hadn't been back since."

"Did they have any clues?" God, Halloween. If she'd been involved… or been hurt by anything this Halloween, I'd have to break the Fifth Law so I could kill Corpsetaker again. And Grevane. And… actually, I'd leave Cowl dead.

"Just that she'd been spending a lot of time with her cousin before she disappeared," Murphy said. "They apparently tried to check to see if her cousin was hiding her, using a private investigator, but they'd come up with nothing useful. Lawrence Astor hadn't been hiding her at his place, at least not since she left home."

I pursed my lips, thinking. "They mention anything about friends, coworkers, other people that might have known her?"

"What do you think I am, Dresden? A rookie?" Murphy asked incredulously. "She knew Lawrence's girlfriend quite well. Judging from the pictures, she wanted to be more than just friends with Lisa Hendricks, but Lawrence was in the way."

"She's not a suspect, Murph," I said. "She didn't do it."

"I know that, Harry." I could almost hear Murphy roll her eyes. "Still, it'd give her a motive if she were involved."

"How's she look nowadays anyway?" I remembered a little girl, ten years old, hair in dark pigtails and feisty as all hell.

"Apparently she wanted to look a bit different than her parents. She dyed her hair," Murphy said. "Not quite my color, but she's a nice honey blonde with dark roots."

Blonde, friends with Lisa Hendricks, and a cousin of Larry Astor… I was making a connection, but I wasn't too sure on how much I wanted it to be right. The coincidences were a bit too much to ignore, however.

"Okay," I said. "Could you come pick me up, Murph?"

"Sure. Where are we going?" Murphy asked. I smiled, glad she trusted me enough to go along with me.

"St. Mary of the Angels." Forthill might know something, and while Michael might have as well, I was fairly confident in my deduction given the facts I now had.

"Why there?" I could almost hear Murphy's eyes narrowing.

"It's a church. Where else would we find Faith?"

AN: Been a while, I know. But this isn't dead.