Title: PSLAYR

Author:Joshua

Disclaimer:BtVS and all related characters belong to Joss Whedon. Psyren and associated concepts belong to Toshiaki Iwashiro and Shonen Jump magazine. Any non-related characters I made up on my own, some based on other fictional characters, or who knows maybe even real people. Please don't sue me.

Summary:BtVS/Psyren(manga) x-over. Xander finds a Psyren card one day and tries it out just for fun, despite his friends warnings. After his first "game" he wishes he'd listened!

Preliminary:

Earth

Sunnydale, CA

Wilkins Memorial Cemetery

Night

"And another one bites the dust," Xander sings as the vampire Buffy had been fighting for the past couple minutes was finally slain.

"Give it a rest, Xan," Buffy groaned, pocketing her wooden stake.

"Yeah dweebo," Cordelia snapped at him, "Do you have to say that every time Miss Superhero does her thing? It's getting really old."

"Uh, thanks for the support Cordelia," the blond vampire slayer remarked as they moved on.

"Oh come on, it's what I do, I'm comedy relief guy, remember?" Xander shrugged, smiling at them.

"Still..." Willow trailed off.

"Et tu Willow?" the brunette teen misquoted.

She shrugged, then gave him a naughty smile and stepped closer to her boyfriend, the laconic werewolf named Oz. Just Oz. Go figure.

"Moving on," Buffy tried to steer the conversation away from any kind of fight between her two best friends. "If you guys want to move on to the Bronze or head on home, I can finish up patrol on my own. Faith's covering the area around her motel tonight anyway, so I've just got one more graveyard and then I'm done for the night. I can meet up with you guys later..."

"Aw, but I brought all my tools for slaying," Xander mock-whined. He held up his cross and stake as evidence before putting the stake in his back pocket. "Not even going to let me get one, Buff?"

Buffy shot him a look, then said, "Xander, while I appreciate the offer, I really don't want you guys getting hurt doing my job. I'm the Slayer. Well, a slayer counting Faith. But we're the ones that actually have to fight and kill vampires. You guys don't have to do any of this."

"Just because we don't have to, doesn't mean we can't choose to," Xander responded.

"The day good people do nothing, is the day evil triumphs," Oz misquoted. To which he got a kiss from Willow for.

"I'm actually all for not getting hurt, and it certainly wouldn't hurt to put in an appearance at the Bronze before they close, would it?" Cordelia remarked.

"OK, fine, but let's at least all go together. And keep Buffy from sneaking off to go see Angel," Xander stated with a disappointed glare in the blond's direction.

Buffy ducked her head, blushing fiercely now, and decided to concentrate more on killing vampires.

"Do you really have to keep bringing that up every fifteen minutes?" Cordelia harshly whispered to her boyfriend. He shrugged unrepentantly and put his arm around her waist, pulling her close. She smiled, but tried to hide it, putting her hands over his on her hip.

They walked along quietly, enjoying the evening, but also keeping their senses open, listening for any screams or sounds of vampires. Buffy out front and the two couples trailing along behind, seemingly in their own little worlds, but actually as alert and ready as an experienced front line soldier.

One might ask what kind of world is it where teenagers, in their own hometown, have to be as alert as those sent off into combat. Sunnydale, CA unfortunately just so happens to have the highest death rate of any city you'd care to name on the North American Continent. Potentially some South American cities too.

The reason for is simple, yet impossible to believe.

Beneath the streets of Sunnydale, or more specifically the local High School's Library, lies the Boca Del Inferno, the Mouth of Hell. Or in American-speak; Hellmouth. A literal gateway into hell, where demons and who knows what else resides. It has the unfortunate side effect, just by existing, in drawing in supernatural creatures, such as vampires, werewolves, the odd demon or 50, and just so happens to be the site for where a lot of things try destroying the world a lot.

One of the people that was drawn to the Hellmouth was none other than Buffy Summers, the Slayer, the one girl in all the world given the strength and power to face and kill the vampires, demons, and general forces of darkness and stop them from destroying the world. Some of the first people she met were the ones walking along with her even now.

They were all just ordinary kids until the day they met Buffy. Things happened around her, things that changed each of them in significant and amazing ways. Xander was forced to kill his best friend, Jesse McNally, who'd been turned into a demonic vampire shortly after the Slayer arrived in town. Cordelia fought to remain normal and most popular girl in school for as long as possible, but eventually she had to face facts and ultimately decided that helping Buffy meant keeping the world, and more importantly the High School and all the shopping malls in one piece. Willow, Xander's Bestest Friend, was a wallflower computer geek that was on a guaranteed track of misery and mediocrity throughout her High School career. Then she got a BFF, Best Female Friend, in Buffy, and gained confidence and learned that she could use magic and was fast becoming a talented witch. Willow's boyfriend Oz, had just been your average bass-playing silent member of the local rock band, until he got bit by his cousin and became a werewolf.

All of them unique, all of them able to put the blame of their uniqueness squarely on the shoulders of the petite blond they followed even now. And they thank her and God for it each and every night.

Finally, after about a quarter of an hour of walking, they reached the last cemetery on their patrol. They all kept alert, and the casual conversation ceased as they went deeper in amongst the gravestones. Though they were experienced at this by now, even Cordelia and Oz, the only one of them allowed to be cocky was Buffy, and she herself was quiet and alert.

Soon they either attracted the attention of, or just bumped into a small group of vampires equal in number to their own. The demon-animated corpses were already 'vamped out' showing their demonic faces, cutting down on the pre-fight chatter. The moment the undead saw a bunch of teenagers walking along in a graveyard at night, they came to one obvious conclusion.

Free Lunch.

Buffy came to her own conclusion, and faster than the vampires did.

Kill Demons. Protect Friends.

Not necessarily in that order, but it resulted in the same thing either way. She pulled out her wooden stake and surged forward with an impressive burst of speed. The first vampire was dust before the rest knew what hit them, and after that they were too busy fighting Buffy to pay much attention to the other teens.

While it was impressive that Buffy could fight four vampires at the same time, they all knew that she didn't stand much of a chance unless she could lower the odds some more or the vamps were incredibly poor fighters. Which, unfortunately, they were not. The gang was not about to stand around on the sidelines however.

Xander pulled out a small single-handed battle ax and charged the vampires attacking Buffy's rear. Oz and Willow pulled out a crossbow and some wooden bolts for it. Cordelia pulled out her own stake as well as a cross and a bottle of holy water made ready to throw.

"Xander! Don't! I got this!" Buffy shouted when she noticed her friend charging into the fight.

Almost as demonstration of her claim, she punched the vamp she was grappling with in the gut before tossing him back and away, right before leaping up in a spin kick that fully connected with the other three vamps trying to tackle her and sent them crashing to the ground, holding their faces in pain. Say what you will about vampires not needing to breathe, they can still feel pain as much as anything.

"Oh, no, I wasn't gonna, I mean I..." Xander trailed off, and then handed her the ax. "Uh, here. I think you can probably do more with it than I can at this point."

"Thanks," she smiled, and then gave him a look.

"I'm gonna..." he gestured back to the gang.

She nodded and agreed. "Yeah. You should do that. Like right now." To emphasize her point, one of the vamps tried to blindside her, but she spun on her heels, swinging out with the ax he'd given her and decapitated the vampire in a single stroke.

Xander quickly turned to run back to the others, but he saw something that almost made his blood run cold instead. Thinking quickly, he charged forward again, this time just off to the left from the others, because that's where the vampire Buffy had thrown was now stalking towards them, and from the looks of it they didn't even see it there.

"Cordy! Stake!" he shouted, startling all of them, his girlfriend most of all.

Thankfully, her instincts were better trained than she was and she tossed him the stake immediately, as well as the glass vial of holy water. Xander caught it and then immediately threw it at the vamp he was targeting. The glass shattered against the demon's skull and its skin began to boil like acid.

"Ahhh!" the vamp screamed, startling Oz and Willow into turning around to face it. Before they could get a bead on it to use the crossbow, Xander rammed into its side, leading with the stake. Thankfully the vampire was too out of it to do much to fight back and it gave Xander the time he needed to raise the stake and to get enough force behind it to drive it home into the undead creature's chest. Moments later he was sitting in a cloud of dust and face to face, ironically enough, with a red and black phone card.

"Huh?" he uttered under his breath.

"That's weird," Xander said to himself, picking the small piece of rectangular plastic up. It was his experience that everything the vampire was wearing or had on when staked through the heart or killed basically, all of that went to dust with the rest of it. And he was equally certain that this phone card hadn't been in the grass prior to the vampire dusting. It might have fallen out of it's pocket when he tackled it, but he doubted that.

By the time he got back to his feet, Buffy had already finished off the other two vamps, although the last one had almost gotten away if it hadn't been for Willow shooting it in its left butt cheek, giving Buffy enough time to catch up to and re-place the arrow to the back side of the vamp's heart. Seeing Xander covered in dust made Buffy less than happy, but understanding what he did and why he did it made it easy to forgive him for almost getting himself killed. She even managed to squeeze in a compliment or two, though it was tough to find amidst all the Buffy-speak.

"Xander! What were you thinking charging in like some kind of idiot?! You could have gotten yourself killed! I had it handled!" she shouted at him. Then blushed and glanced at the others for a moment before muttering, "But, uh, thanks. You, uh, didn't have to do that. But I'm glad nobody got hurt. Nobody got hurt, right?"

"No, but thanks to my boyfriend," Cordelia preened, immediately on Xander's arm, "and no thanks to Miss Superhero Slayer letting that one almost attack us. You're the one that needs to be shouted at!"

"Cordy," Xander patted the buxom brunette's hands comfortingly, while smiling and feeling like doing a bit of preening himself. "Buffy did the best she could. And so did I. I am actually of the opinion that nobody needs to be shouted at right now. How about you guys?" he asked Willow and Oz.

"I'm good. No shouting," Oz replied.

Willow just grinned and mimicked Cordelia in hanging onto her boyfriend. Oz, for Willow that is.

"Hey, what have you got there? Is that a new credit card? What are you doing with a credit card?" Cordelia asked, referring to the card in his hand.

"Uh, no, it's not a credit card," Xander told her. Then frowning to himself, he looked it over once again. "I think it's actually a phone card. No credit card hologram anyway, plus there's this number that kind of looks like a phone number on the back here."

"What is it?" Cordelia asked again, this time looking at the front, squinting in the low light to read it.

"P-S-Y-R-E-N? Puh-cy-ren?" she sounded out.

"No, the 'P' would be silent in that case," Willow automatically corrected her.

Cordelia frowned, before what she said filtered through her brain and she said outloud with more than a bit of confusion. "Psyren? As in siren? I've never heard of that company."

Willow stopped in her tracks, which immediately stopped Oz and had the others turning back after only a couple of steps, looking back to see what was wrong.

"Xan-Xander..." Willow's voice was shaky when she spoke. "C-c-can I see that card p-please?"

"Uh, sure," he shrugged and handed it over. "Why?"

Willow dropped it the moment it was fully in her hands. For good measure she even took five giant steps back from it and did not take her eyes from the rectangular piece of plastic the entire time.

"Uh, Wills? You OK?" Xander asked, now highly concerned. He wasn't the only one.

"Th-th-thats a Psyren card!" Willow exclaimed, pointing wildly.

The others just looked at her, unsure at how to respond. Looking up at them, seeing they didn't understand her fear and reaction, she continued. "You know, Psyren! Nemesis Q! Elmore Woods 500,000,000 Yen payout of any information regarding Psyren? Mysterious disappearances all over the world, localized in Japan? Am I the only one with access to the internet?!"

"Among this group?" Xander pointed out to her. "Five hundred million?"

"Yen," Willow snapped at him automatically. "Exchange currency would put it at five million dollars U.S. plus change. I thought it was an urban legend."

"That what is an urban legend?" Buffy asked, growing concerned by this point.

Xander picked the card back up, ignoring Willow's cry, "Don't touch it!"

"It's just a card Willow," he said after another examination. "What's this about?"

Willow took a breath and let out a heavy sigh. "We need to go to the Library. Get Giles. It'll be easier if I can show you, and he can see for himself. Maybe the Watchers have come across this sort of thing before?"

"What sort of thing? And can we go back to the five million dollars thing?" Cordelia said.

When the rest of them turned to stare at her, even Oz, she shrugged and replied, "Hey, everybody can use an extra five million dollars!" They shrugged and resumed following Willow towards the High School. Besides, she was right about the money at least.

Less than half an hour later, they were all gathered in the Sunnydale High School Library. Giles had called Faith in, and Buffy had called Angel, claiming he might have some insights from the demonic underground. The Psyren card, which only Xander had handled up to this point, was currently placed on the central long wood table, the space around it cleared away so they all had unfettered access to it.

"Now what, what is it exactly that you've asked me to look at here?" Giles asked, wiping his spectacles clean with a white handkerchief, a nervous tick the gang all assumed was associated with being a Watcher.

"Giles!" Willow cried, feeling almost betrayed by the man's obtuseness. "This has been going on long enough that there's practically a cult following of it! Don't tell me you haven't heard of Psyren either?"

"I'm sorry, sigh-what?" the Englishman asked, confused.

Willow threw up her hands and gave an inarticulate scream of frustration.

"Apparently," Xander took over for his distraught friend, "that card there," he pointed to it on the table, "is part of some conspiracy, starting in Japan of all places. There's this creep called Nemesis Q that apparently kidnaps people from all over the world, then returns them after making them play in some "game" that nobody knows anything about. Those that are part of it are apparently forbidden from speaking about it to anyone not also involved with Psyren. Oh, and there's some lady named Elmore Tenjuin that's offering like five million dollars to anyone that con provide her with any information regarding Psyren or Nemesis Q at all. That much, I only know cause Willow was babbling the whole way here."

"She actually used lots more words with more syllables apiece, but nice recap Xan," Buffy agreed.

"Thanks," he blushed slightly, rubbing the back of his neck in embarrassment.

"Elmore... Tenjuin, you say?" Giles trailed off and took his spectacles off again. This time he chewed on the end a bit, telling the teens that he was trying to remember some inane detail that was usually the very clue they needed to save the day.

Willow stopped her ranting and stared at Giles alongside all the others, waiting patiently.

"Giles!" Buffy snapped at him. "Speak!"

OK, maybe not so patiently.

"Oh, sorry, I was just remembering... I used to know her. Her and her husband Koper. They were rather powerful psychics, and made quite a bit of money through fortune telling. Particularly after they went international. They retired shortly before I moved here to Sunnydale. I had heard that Koper died rather recently. She's offering a reward for people to figure out this... this Psyren, you say?"

"Five hundred million yen, Japanese currency," Willow reported.

"Hm," Giles put his glasses back on, but was clearly still turning things over in his mind.

"So what's this supposed to do anyway?" Faith finally lost patience with the silence.

"Nobody knows," Willow answered. "That's just it, normally there would be people talking about this sort of thing all over the place, even if just in conspiracy circles. Instead, everything about Psyren is a complete mystery. Anybody involved does not talk about it at all, and after they get involved, they hide the fact that they are involved. Even demons and vampires get more notoriety, what with the Watchers having books all about them and everything. The only thing anybody knows about Psyren is that it involves these phone cards and some mysterious character named Nemesis Q. Nobody knows how Nemesis Q picks his victims or how he grabs them or where they go or even what Psyren is all about. Nothing!"

"Although, I'm kind of hoping that since the Watchers do have all these books on demons and vampires, that they might have a book or two on Psyren too," she shyly admitted, looking hopefully at Giles.

"No, I'm sorry," he said, "This is the first I've heard of it. I'll make some phone calls however, see what all I can find out. In the meantime, I suggest hiding this... phone card away for now. When we know more we can determine whether or not to destroy it or use it in some way."

"Aren't there like hundreds more out there though?" Xander asked.

At everyone's looks, he continued, "I mean Wills said it, people all over the world are involved with this Psyren thingie here. The only things known is the name of the game, the name of the game master, and that it involves these phone cards. That means that more phone cards are out there if they're so easily recognized."

"Hm, you have a point Xander," Giles admitted. "Still..."

"Just because we have this card doesn't mean we automatically join the game, right?" Buffy asked.

"No, I think you have to use it. Like stick it in a phone and make a call with it or something," Willow answered.

"Maybe I should hang onto it?" Faith offered. "Keep any demons from getting a hold of it. A vamp was carrying this around right? Probably was going to use it too, but Xander here dusted him first. Might mean the demons could be involved in this, right?"

"Then why not let Angel hold onto it?" Buffy offered, looking towards the shadowed corner where her ex-sort-of-boyfriend stood.

"I'm not touching that thing," the broody vampire immediately stated.

Buffy startled, while the others all stared at him in surprise.

"I don't know what it is, and I don't know how that other vampire was even near that thing, but... There's something about it that makes me... uncomfortable," Angel told them. It was only now they realized that the vampire was standing as far away from the table as he possibly could without leaving the room entirely.

"Uncomfortable how?" Xander asked him. "Gotta be specific man. If we're talking cross or holy water bath uncomfortable, then I say we all get one."

"It's giving me a headache," Angel finally snapped at the boy. "And vampires don't get headaches. Not like this one. It's like... my brain is on fire and is set to explode or something. If that other vampire really was carrying this on him, he was either immune, or he was really young. Like less than a year old as a vampire."

"He might have even had it on him already when he was turned," Faith pointed out.

"Heh, exploding vampire heads. That would be kind of cool, don't you think?" Xander mused out loud.

"Only you would say something like that," Cordelia said to him.

"Well, for the time being..." Giles started to say, but Xander interrupted him by picking up the card.

"Tell you guys what. Since I found it, I'll hang onto it. Nobody knows we've got it anyway, and unless there's a way of tracking it, they'll just think we left it in the Library, even if they did know. Unless they've got a way of tracking it, in which case better it not be in the Library or at Faith's motel where she'll be alone in defending it."

"And your place is so much better?" the brunette slayer argued.

"A; it's not something our typical enemies would expect," he held up a finger for each point. "We usually leave stuff we don't want the bad guys to have either here at the Library, or guarded by a Slayer. B; if somebody is tracking this thing, I'm within running distance of both Buffy's and Willow's houses, and ten minutes away from the school or even Giles place. C; Faith's motel is at least fifteen minutes in any direction from the nearest help if somebody attacks her. And D; I found it first, so it's mine." Then he stuck his tongue out at them.

"Real mature there Xan," Buffy sarcastically remarked.

"And what about me hanging onto it?" Cordelia asked her boyfriend. "Not that I want to, I'm just curious."

"Same reasons, except you're twenty minutes away from the nearest help, and that's in your car," he took a jibe at her.

"Oh, OK then," she shrugged it off.

"Besides," Xander said to the rest of the gang, "what do we really know about this thing anyway?" holding up the card. "It could be perfectly harmless unless there's some kind of ritual done with it for all we know right now."

"Hello," Cordelia scoffed, "It's a calling card. You stick it in a phone and then have to answer some kind of question and answer thing. That's how they work. I should know, I've got like twenty."

"But the people who get involved with Psyren disappear!" Willow protested. "They're calling it 'spirited away' but that's still disappearing!"

"Better to hang onto it rather than let whatever vampires or demons get their hands on it," Buffy finally said. "Xander's right about places to hide it anyway. Any time I hide something at my house, I get attacked before the weekend. Same with Angel, and no offense Faith, but I wouldn't trust something like this in your motel even if there were no demons or vampires left on the planet."

"None taken," Faith shrugged it off. Besides, the blond was right, her motel was in a rough part of the neighborhood, and more dark elements than vamps and demons hung around there.

"Very well," Giles sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose tiredly. "Xander, I'll trust this to you then, and please don't try and use it. We still have extremely limited information regarding this. I'll contact Elmore, see what she has to say. Oh, uh, Buffy, if you wouldn't mind staying for a bit, there's something I need to discuss with you. Faith, I'll see you tomorrow for training?"

"Sure thing G," the Boston Slayer waved and was gone before Angel was. Quite a feat considering how quickly the vampire moved.

Meeting over, the other teens quickly left, Xander pocketing the card on his way out, and given how late it was, they decided to just go home, as it was too late to tempt going to the Bronze. Cordelia offered a ride to all of them, but Xander begged off, saying he had to get some homework he left in his locker and he was only a few minutes walk from his home. Oz had left his van with the band that evening, so he and Willow both took the brunette debutant up on her offer.

The minute Xander was sure he was alone and on his own, he made for the Commons Area of the school, and more specifically the new digital payphone that was put in there. One that just so happened to include a slot for phone cards.

Making sure he was alone, and being double-sure by triple-checking all the shadows for Angel, he took out the Psyren card and put it in the slot. He might have hesitated for a moment or two, but that was all. He couldn't really explain why he was doing this. It would be one thing if he knew somebody that was already caught up in Psyren and he had to go save them or something. It would be a completely different thing if it was just about the money. Hey, five million dollars was Five Million Dollars!

But as he put the card in the slot and picked up the receiver, knowing that he was probably doing something insanely stupid, he couldn't deny that there was something about the whole thing that put him on edge. Looking back, he would say that when he first found out about Buffy and vampires and demons and the Hellmouth that even before the whole deal with Willow and Jesse being taken by vampires, his curiosity and fascination with Buffy would eventually have driven him into the world he was now so familiar with.

What he was doing now was more than just plain curiosity however. Xander wasn't one to put much faith in fate or destiny, especially when he and Buffy tended to tie for title of being "Fate's Bitch" what with him getting struck down with every demonic effect aside from vampirism and usually in a highly embarrassing manner at the same time. Now though, what he was doing was more 'preventative planning' on his part.

This whole deal with Psyren and the mysterious Nemesis Q and the vampire having the card, it spoke of bad mojo on the horizon. People being spirited away? Reward money for information on Psyren instead of just the cards or Nemesis Q himself? The whole urban legend and the secrecy and silence behind it? He was uncomfortably reminded of the whole deal with Buffy and Faith being Vampire Slayers and the secrecy and silence behind the existence of demons and vampires and magic and Hellmouths and everything!

This Psyren card was Xander's new "Buffy"and he knew it too.

Eventually, maybe not tomorrow, maybe not even a year from now, but eventually something would happen and Buffy or Giles would be forced to say that they needed to use the Psyren card. And then it would be too late and they'd be trapped by whatever world Psyren lead them to. Even if it was a world they never wanted to be a part of. The possibility also existed that there were demons out there that really wanted the card and somehow he knew that if he used the card first, then it would be useless in their hands. Can't very well hand over something completely useless now can they?

With all that in mind, Xander's decision made and he put the card fully in the slot of the public phone.

The card went in automatically. He didn't even have to slide it in or out, just held it up to the slot, and it was like it was sucked in by the phone. A few seconds later, the phone dialed itself and Xander heard an automated female voice speaking.

"Greetings! Your World is now Connected!" the voice said, hesitating on the multi-syllable words, like English was a second, or even fifth language for her. "You've reached the Immigration Offices of Psyren. We will now commence the Immigration Examination. Please answer the following questions. Each question has two choices. If your answer is yes, please press one. If your answer is no, please press two."

Xander was a bit stunned, yet disappointed at the same time. Somehow he had expected... more. More than a phone survey in any case! Still, in for a penny as the saying goes.

"Question 1. Are you an American citizen older than 12? Dial Yes or No."

Xander hesitated, then hit the number one on the keypad.

"Question 2. Are you worried about the fate of the world? Dial Yes or No."

Considering what he did with his free time, Xander hit the one again.

"Question 3. Have you ever suffered a brain injury or been diagnosed with a serious illness? Dial Yes or No."

Again, Xander hesitated, though this time it was because he wasn't sure how to answer the question. He'd certainly taken his share of hits to the head, though thankfully not as many as Giles had, but he'd never been diagnosed with either a real medical brain injury or a real medically serious illness. He hit the two.

"Question 4. Do you have chronic difficulty breathing, or have you ever felt your planet's atmosphere is difficult to breathe in? Dial Yes or No."

Frowning at the somewhat odd question, and because he'd never had asthma, he hit the two again.

"Question 5. Have you ever dreamed of talking sheep? Dial Yes or No."

He, unfortunately, had to hit the one for that question.

"Question 6. Do you believe there's life in outer space? Dial Yes or No."

The questions went on in this fashion for a little longer, typical SciFi Geek type questions or just general survey to find what demographic he fit into. Until he got into the teen-digits that is.

"Question 18. You prefer a mountain of Twinkees over a suburb surrounded by forest. Dial Yes or No."

Then it got really freaky when he got past question twenty.

"Question 24. You have close friends. Dial Yes or No."

"Question 30. Have you ever killed a living thing larger than a human? Dial Yes or No."

"Question 45. Something you have done changed the world. Dial Yes or No."

Finally, it was getting to be a bit too much and Xander was this close to hanging up the phone, no matter what the consequences may or may not be. To be quite honest, he was on the verge of falling asleep where he stood by this point. At least after a while she stopped reminding him to dial yes or no.

"Question 60. You feel unsatisfied with High School life." One. Everybody was unsatisfied with High School. That's why it was High School!

"Question 61. You don't think anything of the future." Two. Not unless it involved a prophecy of some kind, other than that, not really.

"Question 62. You don't like it when your friends push you away." One—wait a second!

"What kind of question is that?" Xander asked the phone aloud. That kind of question, while not altogether odd, kind of struck close to home for him. He answered it anyway.

"Question 63. Your superhero best friend is trying to protect you by keeping you out of the way. And you find it extremely annoying." Xander nearly dropped the phone and bolted right then and there. He answered the question instead.

"Question 64. You have feelings for your childhood friend. And you're considering cheating on your girlfriend with her." He froze. He had what now?!

The phone was silent, still waiting for his answer, but he didn't know what to do. Finally, having a quick heavy knock down drag out mental wrestling match over the answer in his head, he decided that he loved Cordelia more than he wanted to discover what feelings he may or may not have for Willow, and hit the two.

"Question 65. Your parents are drunken losers that couldn't care less if you disappeared entirely."

Finally, an easy question. Though still disturbing on how this lady had that kind of information about him. Then again, this was the Hellmouth. After vampires, demons, witches, invisible girls, Frankenstein-wannabes and werewolves, a psychic phone survey was par for the course as far as he was concerned. One.

"Question 66. Would you like to go to Psyren?"

Xander had actually been waiting for this question for some time now. He immediately hit the two. Six times. Maybe ten. He couldn't be sure but at least the damn thing was over now. With a sigh, he pulled the card out of the phone and started to walk away, figuring he'd just wasted the only lead they had on figuring out this whole Psyren deal, or at least what vampires had to do with it. He seriously doubted that any vampire would willingly subject themselves to this kind of experience for any length of time, immortal creatures of the night or not!

Behind him, barely hearing it at first, but just loud enough that he stopped in his tracks, he heard the woman's voice call over the cradled receiver, "Examination Complete. We will contact you regarding the results..." He froze when he heard that, unable to move, and feeling like he'd just been told that Angelus, Spike Drusilla, the Master and the Hellmouth Demon were all standing behind him and if he turned around they would kill him in an instant. Otherwise, he had an undefined amount of time before they did kill him.

Xander ran home that night and hid shivering beneath his covers until dawn.

Sunnydale, CA

Sunnydale High School Library

One Week Later

After that night, the others all forgot about the card. Well, not really forgot, but they didn't talk about it and when Giles called his friend in Japan he apparently didn't find out anything new about Psyren, or if he did he didn't bother telling them about it. Willow spent a few more hours on the computer searching just for Psyren, but all she found were the same conspiracy and urban legend websites she'd already visited. Xander, however, certainly did not forget about it.

Mostly he was still privately freaking out over the whole psychic survey thing more than anything else. Plus that last message, the one about how they'll contact him about the results? Hopefully since he hit No to the final question, they wouldn't 'spirit him away' or anything like that, but he had to be honest with himself. This was the Hellmouth for crying out loud!

Though it still bothered him and caused him to worry, Xander was very careful about hiding that worry from the others. Willow and Cordelia especially, as those two meant the most to him and were the most likely to find out in the first place. He also wasn't looking forward to the lectures he'd undoubtedly receive upon informing everyone what he'd done with the card.

Unfortunately, hiding things from Buffy had gotten easier than it used to be. He'd had a lot of practice since she'd come back from running away. After spending a few months hiding his very raw and real anger at her abandoning them, hiding his worry and thoughts over the whole Psyren card deal was easy as cake. Giles and Oz were unsurprisingly the easiest to hide things from, simply from the fact that he rarely saw them outside of Scooby meetings, and even while there unless there was some Hellmouth crisis going on, they didn't exactly do a lot of talking or sharing of secrets. Speaking of Scooby meetings, there was supposed to be one tonight, a few hours after school let out.

Today, Xander had come to school and just went through the motions, hiding his worry, and trying to avoid thinking about the whole Psyren thing too much. He'd woken up, went off to school, met up with Willow and Buffy in the morning for their shared classes, hooked up with Cordelia right before Lunch, spent an hour sleeping during "Study Hall" and enjoyed the laziness of the afternoon classes where he could just hang with his friends, all of which managed to have the same class at the end of the day.

After school was "officially" over, Cordelia had cheerleading practice, Oz was going to practice with the band at the Bronze (closed until sundown generally), Willow went with him, and Buffy and Giles had "training" also known as the afternoon shift of Slayer workouts. Thanks to Giles having the lonely occupation of High School Librarian at a school where nobody except the minority of geeks even bothered learning how to read books, he pretty much had the place to the run of himself. So Faith, also a Slayer, came in about eight or nine in the morning and worked with Giles on bettering her skills as a demon killer, and then Buffy came in the afternoon for the same while Faith went back to her motel to sleep until sunset.

Having nothing to do himself, and a girlfriend-enforced restraining order against watching the cheerleaders practice anymore, he ambled towards the Library, maybe sort of hoping to get an eyeful of Slayers In Spandex. Sadly, much to his disappointment, today seemed to have Giles giving Buffy some training outside of the Library, as nobody was there when he came by.

He hung around, just sitting at the table for about three minutes before boredom and teenage anxiety got to him and he was looking in the office, the stacks, even rifling the shelves and papers all over the place, hoping to find some clue as to where Buffy and Giles had gotten to. He didn't really find anything.

About fifteen minutes after he'd first arrived and already searched the whole place, he heard the phone ring. Except the ring tone was not anything like what the Library phone typically sounded like!

If anything, as he heard it ring a few more times, it sounded like the kind of ring tone you'd hear from a phone booth on TV, the one that sounds like actual bells and stuff. Xander looked around confused for a minute, hoping that Giles would pop up out of somewhere to answer the phone. Hey, he was a student here, not exactly someone important enough to answer the phone. Particularly not if it was important.

Then things got really weird. The ringing was getting louder. And more than that, it felt like it was in his head! He walked over to the phone, and while it did get louder still, it was reverberating inside his skull more than anything else. What's more, this particular phone had a light display showing when there was an incoming call, or a call period. The lights were all off.

Gulping, despite himself, Xander reached out and lifted the receiver off the cradle. It rung one more time, forcing Xander to glance around, see if there was anybody else here, or even another phone. There was no one. Leaning closer, Xander put his ear next to the receiver and whispered, "Hel—"

Psyren

Unknown Location

Unknown Time

"—lo?" Xander whispered, only somewhere between beginning his whispered greeting and finishing it, he was somehow taken from the empty Sunnydale High School Library holding the phone there, and placed in the exact same pose and stance in the middle of a post-apocalyptic waste zone.

Except it wasn't just any waste zone. As he slowly looked around and took in the sudden scenic change, he came across a fallen road sign. The green was faded and the metal mostly rust, but the words printed on it were still very clear. It also made Xander feel like the time he'd staked his first vampire. A vampire that just so happened to be his childhood best friend. It didn't feel good, needless to say.

The sign said; "Welcome To Sunnydale, CA."

Ironically, the spot on the sign where the population was usually posted and had numbers upwards of a thousand, the metal and paint were badly damaged so it looked like it had been scratched out on purpose. For all the boy knew at the time, it had been.

After absorbing the fact that he now stood on an Apocalyptic Sunnydale, Xander looked up and was surprised to find the sky almost black with cloud cover. Only these weren't normal clouds. He wasn't exactly sure what was going on with them, but he could feel it in his marrow that they were not normal. The sunlight barely peeked through in places and was completely blocked in the rest.

Staying quiet for the moment, he slowly turned on the spot, taking in everything that he saw while his mind processed and tried to figure out what the hellmouth had just happened here! Everything within sight was either destroyed, decayed, or barren and not necessarily in that order. Instead of ground or solid earth, it was like the desert had moved into town, but it was a dark, ugly ashy sort of sand, rather than the healthy yellow-brown earth grains he was used to. Buildings, or what was left of them, were collapsed and crumbling in on themselves. All of them showed the same sort of damage however. Like there was some kind of blast or explosion, and they all fell away from that direction. Looking, he saw exactly what he feared and had prayed continuously since sophomore year to never see!

In the distance, a horrid red glow emerged from the earth, shining upwards onto the strange black clouds. Around that red light, figures, creatures flew and lurked. A couple just floated languidly around it, like fishes in a pond. Or sharks in the ocean.

The one thing that he really couldn't help but notice, however, was a certain eight-headed demon, with a lot of tentacle like appendages, as big as anything Xander had ever seen in his life, bigger even. It stood at the center of that red light, reaching a good ten stories into the sky and was over three times that in width. Xander recognized that demon. He had nightmares about it.

Giles had claimed it did have a name, but the teen had never bothered to remember it. He only knew it by what he and his friends called it, only in whispers and rarely if ever. The Hellmouth Demon.

The Hellmouth had been opened.

Hell on Earth indeed.

Against his better judgment, and plain common sense, Xander's body immediately started running as fast as he could move it, towards the Hellmouth and that demon. In his passing a few things moved or skirted around him, but he ignored them. One or two gave a brief chase, but he didn't even bother to pause, running the whole way, even as his lungs started to burn up and his muscles began to cramp up on him, he pushed through the pain and kept running.

He had no clue what had happened to him, but he knew only one thing in that moment. The Hellmouth was directly beneath the Library. The Library where his friends were supposed to be. He had to find his friends.

Maybe a half hour of running later, Xander reached downtown, near the school. Amazingly, the center of Sunnydale wasn't as bad as the outskirts. At least there were still some buildings intact. Not exactly standing, but they were intact and there was potential for shelters among them. The streets too seemed to have survived whatever happened, though they were cracked and badly damaged, at least he was no longer running through that ashy sand.

Finally, he got to where the school lie.

Amazingly, despite the giant tentacle demon right next door, the school itself was largely intact. Come to think of it, Xander observed as he crept closer having slowed down when his objective was in sight, it looked like the school had actually been blasted up into the air, stable on whatever earth lay between it and the actual Hellmouth, and then crashed right next to where it had once rested.

Taking a minute to catch his breath, Xander slowly jogged up to the crumbling building and entered through the broken main entrance. He almost immediately came back out, seeing the hallways and doors caved in from whatever had happened. Working from the outside, he slowly made his way around to the Library's rear entrance, and amazingly found it all still intact. Aside from a few broken windows, nothing looked caved in or broken in that area!

The door, unfortunately, was locked, but picking up a rusted piece of pipe, he quickly remedied that and once he was inside, used the same pipe to barricade the door back into place. Once security was assured, he took a deep breath and slowly turned around to face what he had just left. He blinked in surprise.

Everything was... almost exactly the same as he'd left it. Books were still on the shelves, which while messy, were dust-free, and the floor swept and unbroken. Stepping slowly and carefully, afraid this was some kind of trick or trap, he stepped out of the stacks and into the main Library. Here, at least, signs of the Apocalypse outside were seen.

Not counting the window-front view of the giant demon next door, the table was littered with open demon texts and magic tomes, the chalkboard that Giles only ever brought out for big Apocalyptic situations was out and filled with references and things that were hopefully relevant to the situation. But other than the signs of research being done, the Library was in the same pristine condition he'd left it in not an hour ago!

"What... what is going on here?" Xander's voice croaked, from emotion, from physical strain, even from thirst given how far he'd run and how much he was sweating now.

A noise drew his attention to the office. The sound of someone falling over and dropping something. Both sounds he knew well, from personal experience. And then the worst possible thing happened to Xander.

Rupert Giles stumbled out of the office, only this was not the Giles Xander had seen last.

"Giles?" Xander called, unable to believe his eyes. The man standing before him was at least in his late sixties, if not early eighties. His hair was fully gray, grown out past his shoulders and all greasy and oily, like it had never been washed, ever. He also had a full beard, just as long as his hair and just as gray and unwashed. The man's clothes were beaten and worn, but Xander could never mistake that tweed for anything other than the same jacket suit only Giles would wear. The most disturbing thing however was the man's eyes.

Normally when Xander looked into those blue eyes, he saw confidence, wisdom, and usually annoyance when directed at him. Now, however, he saw something he couldn't recognize. There was no trace of that usual confidence and wisdom he was so used to seeing, none at all in fact. And the annoyance directed at him, which would have been a relief after all this, was replaced by something Xander hadn't expected. Surprise, suspicion, relief and joy all mixed together, alongside that other unidentifiable quantity.

"Who-who-who's there?" the man stuttered, then pulled up a single lens held on a string around his neck. All that was left of his spectacles. "X-x-x-xan... Xander?" he croaked out after a few seconds of looking at him.

"Giles, what... what happened?" the teen gasped as he stepped down from the stacks.

"I-I-I... is it really you, Xander? Are you... are you really here? You look... you look the same," Giles whispered, furiously rubbing at his remaining lens, then looking through it again, only to repeat the process.

"It's me G-man, really," Xander told him, growing concerned. "What happened?"

"G-man..." Giles stared at him, tears forming in the old man's eyes, and he started to laugh. Or cry. Or maybe both? "Only... only you ever called me by that infernal nickname. Hahah! Not even my hallucinations ever got that right. Stupid boy! Where have you been?!"

Xander jumped back, frightened and wondering what had happened that made Giles this angry at him. That lasted the few seconds until Giles continued speaking.

Turning fully to his left, Giles proceeded to berate the empty air. "I told you! I told you that you were doing it all wrong! You never once called me G-man, so that's why you could never fool me! I never liked you, you know! Never could organize my books properly. Don't patronize me! It's not any kind of special filing system, it's the alphabet! I don't care if some of the books are written in demonic languages, they can still be alphabetized, you wanker! At least Buffy and Willow were never so bad as you!"

"Giles!" Xander shouted at the man, his fear much more realized now. "What happened? Where are Buffy and Willow?"

"Xan-Xander?" the old man turned and looked at the teen as though seeing him for the first time. "Is-is that really you? Are-are-are you really here?"

Xander stepped back, his eyes wide and his hands reaching for the sky. He didn't want to believe it, but it was the only explanation, the only reason for what he saw in Giles that he couldn't identify before.

Rupert Giles was crazy. Whatever had happened, whatever it was, it had driven Giles completely insane.

"Giles?" Xander spoke quietly, trying to keep from panicking, and startling a crazy man was never a good idea anyway. "I need you to focus Giles. Please, tell me what happened? I... I just answered the phone and the next thing I know, I'm on the outskirts of town and its literally Hell on Earth! Please, Giles... what happened? Where are Buffy and Willow?"

"Xander?" Giles stared closely at him, ignoring the spectacle lens for the moment.

Slowly, tentatively, as though he were afraid it was Xander that was going to startle and disappear, he reached out and grasped the teen by the shoulders. The moment he actually touched him though, the old man broke down in tears and before the dark-haired youth knew it, he had his arms full of a weeping senior citizen.

It took a while to calm Giles down, but he finally managed to get the silver-haired Watcher into a chair and ready to talk. It was all Xander could do not to give into his own panic, but keeping Giles calm and focused helped him in suppressing it, for the moment, but his concern for his friends was mounting by the second. He had a million questions, but Giles was still very fragile and he knew from handling his family when they got drunk that he couldn't demand any answers right away. He'd have to go at Giles pace.

The good news, at least, was that for the moment the Library was secure. After all, they hadn't been attacked in the past half hour and however long before then when it had just been Giles alone, and the very open and active Hellmouth was literally right next door, so they were probably OK, at least for the moment.

"Giles, Giles!" Xander called, getting Giles' attention focused on him. "I need you to focus here G-man! That's it. Now I need you to tell me what happened. Please. I need to know. Where are Buffy and Willow? What happened here? G-man?"

"Xander... Xander... Xander..." Giles was smiling at him and kept clapping him on the shoulder. Finally, he seemed to register the question and nodded. He cleared his throat and straightened in his chair, obviously trying to gather his thoughts, however out there they may be.

"Yes. What happened. I know what happened, and I should tell you, but..." Giles suddenly teared up, and almost started weeping again as he blubbered, "...but it's so sad."

"Giles? G-man?" Xander cried out, now very worried about his friends. What the hell happened?

"You, you disappeared!" Giles sobbed. "Spirited Away, Willow kept calling it. She wouldn't let go that Psyren and Nemesis something had taken you. Oh god, if only we had known!" He dissolved into sobs after that. Xander leaned back, very confused and frightened.

"G-man! Know what? What if we'd known what?" he pressed. "C'mon, G-man, talk to me!"

"Yes, of course, it's just... I've have no one to talk to for so long," Giles confessed to him. He composed himself as much as possible and continued where he'd left off.

"This, this is Psyren!" he waved and gestured about wildly. Xander didn't need to have a degree in crazy person talk to know what he meant.

"This...? The Library? Please tell me you mean the Library, Giles," the dark-haired teen begged him.

Unfortunately, Crazy-Giles decided to invoke some of his old Watcher-attitude and merely shook his head no. He made the same gestures over and over again, stressing the view outside the windows. Xander sighed and groaned, covering his eyes and rubbing the bridge of his nose as he processed this new information.

"The, the whole world? The whole world going to hell is what Psyren is all about?" he confirmed.

Giles rapidly shook his head, his silver mane flying in all directions. "No, no, no, that's not it. The whole world becomes Psyren! That's what Psyren is. It wasn't an is, not then. Now it is, but then it wasn't yet. It would be, but it wasn't yet. You see?" Giles then smiled at him like a toddler telling his parents about his day.

Xander groaned and covered his face again. Ironically, or maybe unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, he actually did understand what Giles was trying to say. Whether that said he was crazy too, or he was just really good at interpreting babble-talk after growing up with Willow, who knew? The point was, he figured out what had happened to him, and maybe the whole world too. He was in the future. A future in which the Hellmouth opened up and created a hell on earth that called itself Psyren.

What the point of it all was, dragging innocent people here from the past, or the present, whichever, he couldn't begin to fathom. And why use the whole phone card deal for that matter? He had a million more questions and no way to answer them. He doubted that Giles would have the answers to everything, but Xander still had some questions that hopefully the old Watcher could answer for him.

"OK, Giles, I need you to answer a very important question for me, OK?" the old man nodded, his silvery mane shaking wildly. "What year is it?"

He almost groaned out loud when he saw the disheartened look on Giles face after he asked his question.

"I, I, I don't know, I'm sorry," the old man looked shamefaced down at the floor. "My, my calendar broke," he pointed towards the office, where Xander could see from here just how cluttered and messy it was. On the wall, he could just make out the spot where the calendar used to hang, all the pages torn off of it.

"That's OK, Giles," he patted his former mentor on the back comfortingly. "All right, let's go back to the original question. What happened? I get that I'm in Psyren, and that the world became Psyren, but what happened on the go-between? How did the world become Psyren?"

"I, I, I," Giles stuttered, his eyes squished up in thought. "I'm trying to remember, but... it's so hard."

"It's OK G-man, it's OK," Xander sighed, trying not to growl in frustration. "What... what happened to Buffy and Willow? Cordelia? Oz? Faith? Hell, Angel for that matter?"

Giles savagely shook his head. "No! No, no, no, no, no, no! I don't want to remember that! NO!"

"Giles! G-man, it's OK, it's OK, really, it's OK!" Xander scrambled to keep the man calm and focused.

Giles just shook his head, not saying anything else. That alone was answer enough.

"They, they're dead I guess," he finally said out loud.

The silver-maned old timer looked guiltily up at him, then nodded his head once before dissolving into quiet tears. For a time, they just sat their in companionable silence, neither one knew what to say.

Finally, Xander decided that whatever was going on, he couldn't just sit back and accept it, he had to do something, something to change this! They read prophecies by the hundreds every time Buffy came across a new unknown demon. Couldn't visiting the future and going back to the past be considered a form of prophecy? He had to believe that it was, because that meant he had a chance of getting back. He had to hang onto that.

"Giles, I need you to focus for me, OK?" he spoke to the older man.

"Hm?" Giles looked up, and after a few more rounds of their initial conversation, Xander finally got him to come around and focus on what he needed.

"G-man, you remember that Psyren card we found one night on patrol? We found it about a week before I... before I disappeared. Remember it?" Seeing it when the old man's eyes lit up with remembrance, he continued without waiting for a response. "This is that card," he held up the Psyren card, "Now I need to know if you ever found out anything about it that can help me out here. I need to get back to the past, Giles. Willow said that there were people that disappeared and then came back after being spirited away to Psyren. I have to believe that I can get back! Giles, you've got to help me."

"Xander... Xander you, you never came back," Giles sobbed.

"I'm going to change that," Xander stated, the conviction in his voice startling the old man a bit.

"You... yes, yes, yes you could. You could, you can save them. They only died because you weren't here, you see," Giles began to get excited, jumping out of his chair and pacing about. "Willow started using magic, trying to find you and bring you back, but she went dark and killed herself. She killed Oz and many other people too, but if you were here, yes, yes, yes if you were here she wouldn't be looking for you with magic and wouldn't kill people! And Buffy, she, she, she tried to save us all, but after you were spirited away, she just lost all heart. She wasn't in herself, like she was just an empty shell after you left. Cordelia... Cordelia was turned the week after you disappeared and Buffy had to kill her. But if you're here, if we can get you there, then you can stop her from being attacked and that means that... YES!"

Suddenly he raced back into the office and pulled out a bunch of loosely bound papers, sorting through them in a way only known to the crazy old man. After less than a minute of looking at all of the papers in turn, he raced back out to the Library and started dragging Xander towards the exit/entrance.

"Giles? G-man? Giles! What is it? What's the plan, G-man?" he asked, half hoping he had reason to be excited.

"You're not the first one that I've seen here. I've... I've tried to help people, but they all keep dying," the old man sadly admitted, while still dragging him out the door. "Some are survivors, like me. But not many, no, not any at all now... But others! Yes, others, from then, from when, where you are from! Others! Yes! They wander around the town. The demons aren't interested in eating humans anymore, not enough of us. I don't think they eat anymore come to think of it... But the others! Humans, ordinary, dressed, people, humans! They come and they wander and I follow and try to help, but some don't want my help. Others... many, die."

"Giles, slow down, I'm having trouble following you. Well, not that much, and I meant I'm trying to understand what you're saying, but not making much with the sense G-man," Xander stated. They were outside now, and thankfully moving away from the school and away from the open Hellmouth. He wasn't sure where Giles was taking him, but he trusted the old man, even crazy, enough to follow him, for now.

"Drifters!" Giles screamed at him, then looked around and whispered the rest. "They call themselves Psyren Drifters. They're playing a game. They have the card. Just like you do Xander. They explained the game to me, when I tried to help. I didn't understand, but I did try to help."

"I believe you Giles," Xander smiled at him. "Thanks for helping me. Now, where are we going?"

"Yes, yes, yes, help, I'm helping you, so you'll help us. So you'll save them. You'll save them, Xander?" the crazy old man looked back at him hopefully.

Xander just stared at him, letting his conviction speak for him. Giles stared for a second, then nodded firmly and pulled Xander on even faster. It wasn't long before he recognized the same path he'd taken when running to the Library earlier. "Giles? Why are we going back the way I came?"

"Because," Giles whisper-shouted at him, "because of the phone! The phone is near where you first appear. It's always near. They never explained how near, I don't think they knew themselves, but they always said there are two phones, and you're always near the first one wherever it is you appear. Then there's the other phone, the goal phone, the Goal! You have to start at the first phone, the Start, and then from there go to the Goal! That's where we're going, to the first phone. If we get you to the Goal, you'll be sucked into the phone and then you go back, yes, that's what happens."

Xander blinked, not sure, but he kind of followed that.

Apparently, he couldn't be sure, but apparently there had been others wandering through Sunnydale that Crazy-Giles had come across at some point, and they were caught up in the whole Psyren conspiracy thing. Perhaps they'd been 'spirited away' to this place just like him. They'd also known how to play the game, so to speak, and when Giles found them, they'd told him some things while hoping he could help lead them to these phones he was talking about. He just hoped that there was still enough 'Giles' underneath all that crazy that they weren't going to be running towards their deaths in his enthusiasm to help.

Another half hour of jogging and stumbling around later, they arrived at the very spot that Xander had appeared at, his foot prints appearing from nowhere in the middle of the ashy sand. They both took a moment to appreciate that phenomenon, but Giles was not to be distracted, searching the area meticulously for a 'Start' phone. Xander let him look, watching on half-amused as the crazy old man was looking under rocks and pieces of debris that were smaller than his hand just as often as the boulder-sized pieces. The teen, however, just looked straight ahead and stared.

There, roughly twenty or thirty feet at most, directly behind where he'd first appeared, was a highway-side phone booth, standing and in an overall whole condition. It wasn't exactly pristine, but it wasn't so much scrap on the ground, and that was saying something.

"Giles," Xander called, then pointed when he had the crazy coot's attention.

"Oh, there it is!" Giles pointed, bouncing on his feet.

"Yeah, there it is," he nodded back and slowly walked over to the phone booth, Giles following behind.

"So," he said to his crazy companion once he was standing in the phone booth before the, miraculously intact, digital telephone, "what happens now?"

Almost as if in reply, the phone actually began to ring. The two men, of course, nearly jumped out of their skins, and Xander still felt like sloughing off when the phone continued to ring. Finally, having more to do with Giles' urging than his own courage, Xander picked up the phone and put it to his ear.

*FLASH!*

Those Seeking Psyren Shall Taste Power and Despair!!

'What the—!' Xander leapt back from the phone booth, feeling a presence, in his mind, speaking.

Those Seeking Psyren Shall Taste Power and Despair!!

Those Who Reach Psyren Shall Be Granted the World!!

There Is Only One Exit In This Game.

Xander wasn't sure what was going on, but suddenly he felt like his head was wrapped up in some kind of dream or vision or something, while his body was still standing there outside the phone booth while this voice talked at him. Then the dream changed and he saw something in his mind. Like a doorway that was light years away, but approaching at warp speed or something.

Those Seeking Psyren... Those Searching For The Exit From This World... Find the Gate!!

Suddenly the door was visually right in front of him, and he saw another phone, this one just inside a gas station or some kind of convenience store. Then the next thing he knew, he was back in his body and the dream was over. It was just him and Giles standing outside the phone booth, nobody talking and no doors of light either. Giles, oddly, didn't seem too affected by it, or maybe he hadn't seen and heard what Xander had.

"What... what just happened?" the teen asked out loud.

"You heard the voice?" Giles said. "Good. They always started looking for the Goal after they heard the voice. There was something else though..."

"Gate," Xander said.

"Hm?" the crazy old coot looked back up at him.

"The... voice, that cra—uh, that lady's voice from the phone survey, it was her voice. Said if I wanted to get home, I have to find the gate. Then I saw picture of it. Hey, uh, Giles, I don't suppose you know if there are any gas stations still standing around here somewhere, are there?"

Giles, however, was shaking his head and muttering to himself. It sounded like, "There was something else, I know there was more, something more, something else, they did something else more..."

"Giles? G-man!" Xander called. "You trying to remember something?"

"Ah!" the old man exclaimed. "Of course! Yes, that's it. Xander, on the, the, the phone there. Hit the memory button. Please, just do it," he added when the teen shot him a look.

Reluctantly, and more to humor the crazy old man than anything else, Xander looked at the available buttons on the digital phone and then hit the button labeled 'MEM' and waited. Instantly, on the digital screen, a map popped up. Xander blinked, shot Giles a look, smiled, then turned back to the map. "Way to go G-man!"

Near as he could tell, it was a very localized map. Didn't even go that far into town and started at the very border of the town, where the phone booth itself was. As a matter of fact, judging from the display, he saw two small icons on the map that drew his attention. One was at the bottom labeled with an S and had a small phone attached to the letter. Then, in the upper right corner of the screen was another icon, this one looked like some curved J or something, but really it looked more like a door with a key in it. The Gate, he realized.

Following the map and the displayed directions, he looked back towards Sunnydale and the direction he'd have to walk. Taking a deep breath, he made sure to memorize the map as much as possible, and then turned to Giles and without a word the two of them started walking.

Five minutes later, they were running as fast as they could.

"I knew my luck couldn't hold out!" Xander screamed as the two of them tried to outrace the demon that was chasing them down the street. It wasn't a breed that Xander recognized, but then he usually relied on Giles for that sort of information, and the man had just taken one look at the behemoth and started running. Surprisingly for an old guy, Giles was pretty spry.

"Xander...!" Giles gasped, as they continued running, dodging obstacles and avoiding their chaser. "There's... more I... have to tell you... that I should tell you... but..."

"Run now, talk later!" Xander shouted at him. "I thought all the demons didn't chase humans anymore!"

"I said MOST, not all, you insufferable idiot!" Giles shouted back. "Why am I hallucinating again?"

"Giles? NOT Hallucinating here!"

"Oh, well then, I suppose I'd better do something about that creature then, shan't I?" Giles commented.

Xander looked at him like he was crazy, which he was, but even crazy people don't talk about taking out demons like it's just a mild inconvenience! Well, unless they happen to be just as insanely powerful as they are insane... uh-oh.

Giles stopped in his tracks and turned to face the demon charging right for them. It could best be described as some kind of white bull, except that it was a lizard with a tail and claws instead of hooves, and the white part came from the fact that it was covered in the same ashy sand as the rest of the place. The thing had a roar like something out of a Jurassic Park movie, and it's front limbs were more like talons than feet or arms.

Xander skidded to a halt, and it was all he could do just to turn around. He was a heartbeat from running in and tackling Giles to the ground before dragging him onward, but it was already too late. He'd never make it in time. All Xander could do was watch as Giles got himself killed for him, probably trying to buy him time to run and... hold the phone.

Giles raised one of his withered hands up in front of him, as though calling for the monster to stop, while his long silver gray hair and beard waved in the dead wind of the wasteland. The seriously weird part of it though? The thing actually stopped!

More than that, it skidded on the sand, as though it weren't just trying to stop, it was trying to start running away in a whole other direction. Away from Giles! Giles!

The reason why soon became obvious to the teen as Giles raised his second hand and opened his fingers wide, like he was about to catch something. A second later, the demon cried out in horrible, gut-wrenching pain and tears in it's ash-covered flesh began to appear and tear away from it. It soon became more than that as the tears and gashes were just the side-effect as piece-by-piece, the demon was torn apart, or better descriptor dissolved and all the pieces of dust or whatever it became flew into Giles' outstretched hands like a reverse whirlwind effect.

When it was over, Giles was standing there, calm and crazy as ever, with what was left of the demon, bare and bleached bones, in front of him. Xander gulped when the crazy old watcher turned and started walking back towards him.

"Uh, Giles? G-man, how..." Xander gulped and then finished his question as he resumed following Giles, "How'd you do that? Was... was that magic? Were you using dark magic?"

"Hm?" Giles looked at him, confused but not angry. "Oh, that. Yes, well, I'm afraid you'll discover that in about another three or four hours. It only takes six hours to become affected, and it doesn't take much to be affected I've discovered. Not to worry, not to worry my boy. You'll be fine. Just... remind me to help you out when you get back. I won't know any of this of course, not if we're right about you being sent back."

"Giles, please, for the love of Twinkees! Start making sense!" Xander exclaimed.

"Ah, here we are," Giles pointed just up ahead and Xander turned and stared.

Sure enough, an old worn down, but still standing gas station. Looked like something out of the eighties, but Xander could see from where he stood that there was definitely a phone just inside. He could see it through the broken front window. Deciding to get the answers to his questions in relative safety, Xander grabbed the old man by the arm and dragged him inside.

Once the door was shut, and Xander had quickly looked through all of the rooms available in the small building to confirm they were truly alone, he turned and sat the old man down and started asking questions.

"All right Giles," he began, "Start talking. You may be crazy, and you've certainly got good enough reasons to be, but I've got to believe that my friend, a man I trust and respect is still in there somewhere. You're a Watcher, the stiff-upper-lip, tweed-wearing, tea-time, smart guy with all the info type person. So give me something I can use to stop this from happening. Please!"

"Of course Xander," Giles said, smiling and patted the boy on the knee. "I'll do all I can. I know how much is riding on you getting back to stop Buffy and Willow from... well from..."

Xander cut him off there with a wave of his hand. "We'll get to that. You said that what drove them over the edge was me disappearing. I go back, that stops them from dying right there. But what about the rest of it? How did you kill that thing out there? What was it anyway? How did the Hellmouth open up and what happened to the whole world for that matter? Just because Buffy was off her game was no reason for the rest of this to have happened!"

"No, no you're right," Giles nodded stiffly. "Buffy couldn't have stopped the rest of it if she'd tried. There was... there was so much going on. Too much. We couldn't... You have to go back Xander, it's the only way, and it's better if you get home and stay in bed as soon as you do. That headache was a nightmare, and the nosebleed certainly didn't help matters."

"Nosebleed?!" Xander shot to his feet, checking his nose as he did. Thankfully it came back dry and not-red. "Giles, you'd better start making with the sense here! What nosebleed? What headache? What are you talking about?"

"Hm, I didn't explain already? How silly of me," the silver-maned Englishman chided himself.

"It's the air, you see," he pointed to the ceiling and then all around. "Something in the air, it came about when the sky grew dark. It only takes one whiff, and then six hours later... Well, there's a fever, a terrible headache, comparable to migraines I believe, and the nosebleed that doesn't stop until the rest of it does..."

"Giles!" Xander called, trying to get him back on track. "What about the air? What's in it? Something demonic, like a plague?"

"Plague? Oh no, no, no, no, nothing like that my boy," Giles shook his head. "It does something else. To your brain. Not the mind, other things affect the mind, I assure you," he added at the look on Xander's face. "There are natural limiters built into the human brain that keep it from, well from overworking itself. From overheating, I once heard someone call it. These limiters are something of a survival trait, a part of evolution that we needed in the past and has been made universal in the present."

"Well, I say the present, but I mean your present of course," Giles started to ramble.

"Giles?"

"Oh yes, where was I?"

"Something about brain limits?" Xander shrugged, then joked, "Which would make a perfect excuse for my grades, come to think of it..."

"Ah, well, I'm afraid you won't have that excuse anymore, not that these limiters have any affect on intelligence mind you," Giles smirked at the younger man.

Xander was taken aback, eyebrow raised, he couldn't help commenting, "G-man? Was that a joke? At my expense? Wow! A monumental moment in history, and all it took was you losing your marbles to get a sense of humor. Go figure."

"Hmph!" Giles snorted and crossed his arms petulantly for a moment, then remembered what he was talking about and continued. "Anyway, the reason you won't have that excuse anymore has to do with what the air here does to people. To humans at least. I don't think it really affects demons all that much, other than making them rather... lethargic?"

"What does it do to humans?" Xander asked, concerned.

"It removes them," he said. "The limiters I mean. The built in limitations of the human brain, that which keeps it from overtaxing itself in day-to-day life. Without those limiters, we..."

"Die? Go crazy? Can't eat processed foods anymore?" Xander panicked.

Giles sighed and rolled his eyes. "Now I remember why my hallucinations of you were always so annoying. No, to all of that. The potential of the human mind is unlocked without these limiters in place. In the past, a few individuals here and there have managed to tear down or overcome those limiters on their own, but the air here... it dissolves them completely. And to give you a hint, the ones that overcame the limiters on their own were known as psychics."

Xander blinked and sat back down, hard.

"So... the air, or whatever is in it, gives humans psychic powers?" he clarified. Giles just nodded.

"Anything else I need to be freaking out over? Other than a headache, fever and massive nose bleeding that is? Cause I'm thinking I'm ready to go back now, unless you're trying to kill me before I go back by giving me a heart attack here."

Giles just shrugged. "Well, you did ask. That's what happened with that poor unfortunate fellow out there. I have learned that me being a Watcher seems to have gifted me with more than just a calling. I can see, or 'Watch' rather, just about anywhere I care to. In the present at least. I can also 'Watch' the insides of demons, or people if I want to. I discovered shortly after the Hellmouth opened that I can also manipulate or control the things that I 'Watch', but only at a molecular level for some reason. I've tried to do bigger things, but it never seems to work just right. Didn't you wonder? About why the Library was intact? Why we weren't attacked until that idiot came charging in after us, only because he was half-blind at any rate?"

"Wait you mean..." Xander trailed off and stared wide-eyed at his old friend. "No way."

Giles smirked and replied with a very American, "Way."

"Yeah, I walk through the Valley of Death, fearing no evil, because I'm the baddest ass there," Xander quoted, shaking his head at Giles, smirking the whole time.

"Not quite, but something like that," Giles just shrugged. "You need to go now. And don't worry about me. Save Buffy and Willow, and I'll be saved with them."

"Will do," Xander got to his feet and shook the old man's hand. After a moment, they embraced in a manly hug and then let go.

Xander walked over to the phone, glanced back one final time at the old and broken man, then picked up the receiver and put it to his ear.

Earth

Sunnydale, CA

Uncle Bob's Gas station

Three Hours After Xander Vanished

The next thing he knew, and he hadn't blinked or anything, he was standing in a closed down gas station, where the glass was not broken, but the lights were off. Thankfully though, the sun was still up, but it was very close to setting. On the other hand though, he thought as he put the phone down back on the cradle, he was now trapped in a closed or abandoned gas station a few miles from his home and according to future-crazy-Giles, he was on a clock. He had less than three hours to get home and to bed before he started leaking vamp-bait from his nose. A quick check of the front door proved him right, he was locked in.

After checking out the rest of the place, Xander quickly considered his options. Try to jimmy the lock on the front or back doors, the latter of which was also boarded up. Throw something through the front window and run home as fast as he could. Or sit around and hope that on the off-chance this place hasn't been shut down, that somebody comes around and lets him out with no questions or scruples, like wanting to call the cops.

'Throw something through the window it is then!' He thought cheerfully.

A quick look around and he finally found something to do the trick. A big old rock, which he could only assume was for propping the door open, or maybe as a really big and awkward paper weight. Considering he found it behind the front counter, it could've been for just about anything.

Unfortunately, glass doesn't break as easily as movies and TV shows make it out to be. While Xander wasn't exactly on the softball team, he knew the fundamentals of throwing something and he hit the glass square each and every time. It still took another half hour of constant chucking at the thing to even get it to crack. He even tried throwing pieces of un-bolted-down furniture at it, which was only a small wooden chair that weighed less than the stone by about five pounds. He stuck with the stone until finally a spiderweb crack formed at the center. Ten or twenty more throws like that and finally it shattered like so much glass. Damn near bullet proof glass, but there you go!

Using the chair to clear out enough so he could actually get through without cutting himself, and he was on his way home, running through the not-ash-covered streets under a blue and yellow-setting-sun sky! Extra bonus; not a demon or vampire in sight the whole way home!

Not that he was going to stick around to wait for the sun to set to find out for sure, but the point was that he was back! Whether the whole thing was a trick or delusion or something else didn't matter for the moment. He'd glimpsed the future and now he had a chance to change it, to prevent that hell from coming to earth!

An hour and a half later, he was back home, as in his home, the Harris residence, and had just finished taking a shower, cleaning off all the dust and ash left over from his brief 'visit' to Psyren, and was staring at himself in the mirror. He did this too, after Jesse had been... After the Harvest had been stopped, he'd looked himself in the eye and sworn a silent vow to himself to never let another friend be taken by the dark like that.

This time, as he looked straight into his brown eyes, he vowed that he would not stop until he'd finally prevented that future of Psyren from ever happening. No matter what it took, he wouldn't let it happen.

Right after he cemented this new personal vow, some cosmic being decided to ram a metal spike the size of a two by four plugged into a car battery into the center of his skull and leave it there after turning the battery on to full! A second later, they decided to hammer it in a few more times until the tip of the spike touched his spine!

At least that's what it felt like to Xander as he grabbed the sink with both hands and suffered through the pain. When he had enough sense to look back up into the mirror, he saw the lower half of his face covered in blood, coming from both nostrils and it wasn't trickling either.

'I guess he wasn't kidding about the headache and nosebleeds,' Xander thought about crazy-Giles warnings from the future.

About ten seconds after this revelation filtered itself through his mind, the fever struck full force and without any mercy whatsoever. It took all of Xander's strength just to grab a dirty towel for his nose and crawl his way into his bed where he spent the rest of the night. If anybody had bothered checking on him, they would have seen the fever break exactly 360 minutes after it started. If he hadn't been unconscious at the time, Xander might have wondered what kind of fever lasts exactly six hours down to the second?

Then again, he'd have plenty more to wonder and worry about in the coming days.

TBC...?