Your Eyes Have Seen

by Oxnate

My title this time comes from the song Your Eyes Have Seen by Harry Manx. Do not own. Though I am listening to it as I write the first chapter. You should too.

Disclaimer. Do not own Highlander or Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Highlander timeline follows the series only through Modern Prometheus in Season 5. No demon Ahriman or the death that caused. No movies are considered canon however 'Highlander Reunion 2008' is if you can find it.

Summary: Xander decides that Angel isn't the only guy who can wear a trench coat.

Inspiration and banner provided by cloudleonsgurl. Inspiration from the story Don't You Hurt My Girl. Banner from Worlds She Never Walked 2. (On TTH)

Chapter 1.

"Hello! That was our touching reconciliation moment there." Xander said as Buffy walked away, ignoring him.

Buffy walked over to a frilly, pink, 18th-century gown.

"I'm sorry, it's just... Look at this." She said.

"It's amazing." Willow agreed.

Xander frowned. "I dunno. I think Angel might look silly wearing that. On second thought; yes, you should definitely get it for him." He was pointedly ignored.

The shopkeeper appeared next to Buffy and took the dress off the mannequin. "Please, let me."

"Oh, i-it's..." Buffy gushed.

But Xander lost interest suddenly. There was only one person that their group knew who had been alive in the 18th century, and it was obvious to Xander who Buffy was buying the dress to impress. He let out a sound halfway between a sigh and a growl and marched off to put his toy gun back where he'd found it. Clearly, being a big, strong soldier wasn't the way to Buffy's heart. Apparently, you had to wear a long, dark coat and have lived in the 18th century. Suddenly, a costume idea came to Xander in a fit of inspiration. A trench coat. Not at all similar to the long, dark coat that Angel wore (Xander told himself). But even if it was similar, so what? Plenty of people had been wearing trench coats for a long time before Angel ever had. And he was thinking of a very specific someone at the moment. And with access to the weapons cage, he could pull it off too. And what do you know, the trench coat in front of him was on sale. How convenient.

Xander spent that night hunched over his mother's sewing machine. The TV show never really showed how Immortals were able to keep their swords inside their trench coats and the practical logistics were driving Xander to frustration. The arming sword he had gotten from the weapon cage was both real and real sharp. Xander's first effort of sewing a loop of fabric into the coat hand been sliced in two the first time he tried it. Only fast reflexes had kept him from losing a toe. He was pretty sure his parents wouldn't notice the chunk of carpeting the sword had dug out of the floor. But even if they did, he doubted they'd care.

The next effort had been leather and harder to cut. It made it to the unsharpened shoulder of the blade and held fast. Except that the tip of the sword was swinging freely still and cut through his jeans and left a small gash in his leg when he tried to walk. After bandaging his leg, he tried a third time. A leather pocket sewed into the coat where the tip hung helped hold it still and also helped distribute the weight of the sword.

Xander practiced walking with the sword yet again. He didn't get cut any more. But his shirt and his pants would occasionally catch on the blade as they swung against each other. He finally solved that by laying a strip of cloth over the blade and sewing it down each side. In the end, he looked at it and realized he'd basically made a cloth and leather sheath for the sword. But his was a good deal lighter than the one that had come with the sword and was now laying on his bed. And he'd learned a valuable lesson. It actually was possible to draw a sword from a sheath inside your coat, though not quite the way they did on the show. Some snaps or buttons would be necessary for that and Xander didn't feel like getting that crafty. He already was planning on never telling anyone about his prowess with a sewing machine. If that information got out, his man-points would fall into the negative.

The next night Xander was screaming. Or trying to scream. Not that the guy in control of his body seemed to be listening or even able to hear him. But Xander was aware of and could feel everything that was happening to his body, including the fact that his back had just been raked by claws that had torn through his trench coat and the sweater beneath it and into his back. Xander's body spun and beheaded a full size demon – Xander really hoped that it wasn't another grown kid in a costume – and added one more victim for the night. Adding to mental wounds that dwarfed the physical wounds he'd just received. He had centuries of memories now. Centuries of death. Even if those deaths had been caused by someone else, that someone now occupied Xander's place in the world. That when he'd caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror and found he looked like the character he'd dressed as didn't really help, it only added a bit of resentment that Buffy and Willow had gone of versions of themselves and got to keep their own faces at least. And even in Xander's changed body, the killing had continued.

That he had killed Larry still sickened Xander.

Sure, Larry was a jerk and his costume had been trying to rape Buffy at the time, but Xander had been hoping for a swift kick to the balls and then for the bully to be knocked unconscious. Beheading had seemed excessive. Also excessive was the amount of blood in the jock. The human body held a lot of blood and it tended to spray everywhere when the head and body were separated from one another (also not something that was covered on Highlander).

And now Xander was being sprayed by greenish demon blood, covering up the blood splatter from Larry and some of his other victims.

The demons were surrounding him and pushing him back – away from Buffy and the others. Angel was also fighting, but he wasn't willing to kill possessed children like the person Xander had dressed as was. "Fucking kill something, boyscout!" Xander felt himself yell.

But Angel did not and soon he was subdued and Xander had a whole pile of demons on top of him. From under the pile and through some demon legs, Xander could see Spike approach a helpless Buffy. Then suddenly, the weight on his back decreased as he saw Spike come away with a brunette wig.

Xander was still helpless though under the pile of children. As they slowly got off, Xander had to watch as Buffy beat Spike up a bit before he ran away.

As soon as Spike was gone, Buffy made sure everyone was okay, including helping Xander to his feet. "You okay, Xan? Glad to see your real face again."

"You guys remember what happened?" Cordelia surmised.

"It was horrible. I was there, but I couldn't get out. I couldn't affect anything." Xander explained.

Cordelia nodded. "Yeah, but at least you had a cool accent but somehow even your other face managed to look dorky."

Before Xander could reply, Angel stepped up to Buffy. "Are you okay?" he asked tenderly.

"Yeah." she replied as they walked off together.

Cordelia was shocked that anyone could ignore her. "Hello?! It felt like I was talking, my lips were moving and..."

"Yeah, yeah. I know, Cor." Xander brushed her off too. He found his sword where it had been kicked aside, cleaned it, and checked it for damage. He then put it back in its sheath. ...And promptly cut part of the stitching out of his coat sheath. Perhaps it needed a bit more leather.

"Whatever. I guess you better get them back to their parents." Cordelia indicated the surviving kids.

"Yeah and... where's Willow?" Xander looked around. The ghost that had been berating his possessor most of the night was gone.

In all the noise and confusion of the last few minutes of battle and then getting the remaining kids home, Xander couldn't remember if his wounds had healed before or after the spell ended. And they had healed. His back barely even showed pink scars where the claws had deeply scratched him. An examination of his body had found numerous other small wounds (that had healed to pink) that he had never even been aware of.

So now Xander stood in his bathroom holding a knife in one hand and the other over the sink. And he honestly wasn't sure which outcome he was hoping for. No sparks would mean he was still human, still normal, and destined to be on the fringes of the fight against evil. But blue sparks would mean he would have to watch as all his friends and family slowly aged and died.

And whether he was Immortal or not, it seemed that 5,000 years of memories were his to keep as a parting gift. And the memories kept coming unbidden. He looked in the mirror. The carefree eyes he'd had yesterday were gone. Now, his eyes had the look of those that had seen 5,000 years of death and destruction. He had been called many names over the years, though one seemed to follow him the longest. "Methos." Xander hissed as he drew the knife across his palm.

A/N: "You okay, Xan? Glad to see your real face again." - Apart from the Golden Trio, people's faces changed during Halloween. In canon, the Trio's faces did not change because they went as alternate versions of themselves. (Private Harris, Lady Buffy, and Willow's own ghost) Methos looked like Methos during the spell.

Is Xander an Immortal? Stay tuned next week (ok, probably a couple days) to find out!