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(This is original story written by Chris Kenworthy, based on the Buffy characters, who he does not own etcetera etcetara...)
"What was the meaning of such an inappropriate display?" Tojo asked him, also working to seperate Xander from Willow. But once that was done, it became obvious to all that Willow had been affected very remarkably by Xander's actions - she was standing unsteadily, tears streaming down her cheeks.
As Cordelia and Tojo watched, flabbergasted, still holding Xander's arms, the lovely twenty-eight year old Willow Rosenberg only just barely managed to sit down on a couch, crying uncontrollably. "I... I didn't mean to do it," she sobbed. "It's happening all over again - but I can't stop it..."
Xander shook himself free of the helpfully restraining arms of his friends and quickly rushed over to sit beside Willow on the couch, putting a comforting arm around her shoulders. "Didn't mean to do what?" he asked, his voice full of helpful concern, though his words were slightly prodding. "Willow, what's going on?"
"It was all a lie," Willow cried out sadly. "Well, not all of it, but enough to ruin everything. The things I told you... IT told you, using my voice, my body... We've already been through this..."
"Been through what?" Xander asked.
"A time loop?" Tojo guessed. "When you were young, you had visitors from the future come, and yet when you came back, you couldn't tell us about that... because the time loop had to feed into itself?!?"
"Something like that," Willow whimpered. "Yes, when I was in your time frame, Xander and Cordelia came back from the future, and Xander told me that he talked to a future me. They said and did exactly what we've done today... because we were forced to."
"And..." Cordelia prodded. "Well, how did the future work out in your time?" Willow just looked up at Cordelia with pain and sorrow in her eyes. "Oh, never mind," Cordelia said with a rueful smile. "I can guess. Death, destruction, evil STILL takes over the world. Am I right??"
"Pretty much," Willow said sadly. "The Slay-staff could kill every other vampire, but it couldn't penetrate the defenses the Fireking used to protect himself - and Luke. The information Xander and Cordelia gave Buffy and Angel let them attack by surprise, but the overall result was the same - Angel taken by Obayana, Buffy killed by Luke. The only really significant difference is that there are still Slayers in this future - we knew well enough to keep Marea and Catillian from fighting the challenge match with Samael. But they, and we, are being overrun anyway."
Willow wiped a tear away. "We still held out hope. After all, if I could crack time-travel once, I could do it again, and I did. We had arranged a new plan of action - better understanding of the prophecies, a postcognitive clue from the future, and a little bit of the same strategic information. Only Xander would go this time, we decided, and meet up with Buffy's party."
"So what happened?" Xander asked.
"We didn't realize... that the Council of the dead had found out about the time-travellers the first time. Jasper Sinclair worked out... that the only way to keep the world of their victory alive, and to keep us from changing the past, was to complete the loop."
Willow took a deep breath, puncuated by gasping sobs, and began again. "They attacked my workshop, six months before the target date. Killed everyone who was there, except for myself, Xander and Cordelia - we had to watch a half dozen of our best friends and comrades die. Seized all of my work - like the obsessive brain I am, I had the whole time-travel spell worked out by then, and all of my research painstakingly recorded. It must have taken Jasper all of a week to get up to speed."
Willow sighed. No-one was interrupting her or prompting her now - they listened with rapt attention. "They tortured the three of us - getting every single detail of our visitation by our future selves straight. I tried to resist it, to fight, to lie, but by the time Darla was through with me I couldn't lie any more." She paused, more uncertain than ever now. "And they used that information... to brief the Spectres they called to posess us - just before they sent us back. To make their victory complete."
"But they didn't!" Xander interrupted, a wide grin on his face. "I figured it out, and I got through to the real you, Willow. I can contact Buffy and Willow through Elysium, tell them to ignore whatever the future us's said to them. We've got a fighting chance to change the future. And you... you can give us the real dirt now, the information you'd have passed on to complete your plan, can't you?"
Willow was shaking her head sadly. "That won't change anything," she said. "Jasper worked out a devilish determinant to add to my time-travel setup. If the past changes, the three of us are re-set in time. We'll find ourselves back at the start of tonight, with the Spectres back in charge of our bodies. And none of you will remember tonight. Those evil spirits will keep learning from their mistakes, and eventually they'll fool you and win Jasper the victory. Either that, or the world gets trapped in this time loop, just replaying these six hours over and over again."
"There is no way to stop this?" Tojo asked.
"One way," Willow said, "but it's almost as bad as the alternative. These rings," and she held up a large emerald stone on her right hand, "are all that keep the three of us stable in a time period that isn't our own. If the three rings, on my hand, Xander's, and Cordelia's, are removed at the exact same time, we'll drop out of the timestream and this whole timeline will collapse. But it would have to be done within twenty minutes, before the time alloted us runs out. How can we even arrange that in so short a time, with the Dome in our way??"
Xander didn't waste the time to answer to her. His eyes were closed and he was already in Elysium.
* * * *
"Giles??" Xander called out as he arrived.
"I'm right here," Rupert Giles told him mildly. Xander spun around and spotted the Watcher, (could he still be called a Watcher, now that he was dead?? Whatever...) standing at the kitchen counter and vigorously whipping into a glass bowl with a metal whisk. "What is it?"
"Big trouble," Xander told him. "Serious hurry. Can you, um, get Buffy or Willow here?"
"Wha-- why?" Giles said. "This... this can't wait until they check in on their own??"
"Big-time no," Xander told him. "We've got about twenty minutes, and probably a lot to do. You brought Buffy in here once, didn't you? Before any of us knew about Elysium, didn't you?"
"That was me," Jenny said, walking out of the den. "And yeah, we can do it again. Just need for one or both of them to close their eyes, and we can get 'em here."
"Do it," Xander said shortly. Noticing Giles' still questioning and curious expression, he explained. "There's, well, there's Slayerettes come from the future, and we think some have come to Buffy, and Willow, and Angel... but they're posessed and we need to drop them out of the timestream. Tell Buffy to abjure them for Spectral posession - she'll know what that means, Buffy will."
"Buffy will what?" the Slayer said, appearing next to Xander. "Xander?? What's going on? I wasn't trying to get into Elysium."
"I know, but I needed to tell you this. Xander and Cordelia from the future are at your camp, right?"
"Uh, yeah," Buffy said, nodding. "I guess that means Future-Willow found you in Sunnydale, didn't she?"
"Yeah," Xander told her. "But she wasn't really Willow - she was posessed by a Spectre, and says that the other two probably are too. Restrain or abjure them. We need to drop all three out of them out of the timestream at the same time."
"Huh?" Buffy said, confused.
"I know you're confused," Xander told her. "But we don't have much time if we're gonna do this, okay?" He dodged forward, kissing Buffy insubstantially on the lips. "Zap the spectres out, and then pop back here, got it?" Buffy frowned, but popped out of Elysium with a determined look on her face.
"Xander," Jenny said, "while we're doing this, would you mind if I popped over to meet your Future Willow briefly? There's a spirit receptacle near your body that I could transfer over to, maybe even talk through Cordelia or something."
"Oh, yeah, the recieving crystal, they just brought it in," Xander remembered. "Okay, let's go." He took a deep breath and popped out.
"It's so frustrating," Future Willow was saying. "Even if we get this thing to work, you'll be back at square one - you won't remember any of the plan. We'll be right back where we started."
Tojo looked at Xander when he noticed that the teenager's eyes were open, and Xander spread five fingers to indicate minutes until he would check on Buffy again. "Well, why don't you tell us the plan anyways," Tojo suggested. "You never know - we might remember something, and it'll keep you occupied while we're waiting anyways."
"Okay," Willow said, sighing. "First, the prophecies from the other side - that Obayana would open the Hellmouth on the Winter Solstice, and another one we heard about from the vampires - that Luke would cut Buffy down and she would never rise again. We don't think that those prophecies can be broken, but maybe they can be worked around."
"So," Cordelia interpreted. "We can't kill the Fireking before he opens the Hellmouth, but maybe after he has - like Buffy killed the Master, and the hellmouth will close again. And Buffy can't save her own life, but she could dust Obayana before Luke kills her."
"Maybe," Willow said, wincing at Cordelia's bold phrasing. "Second, a few weeks after the Hellmouth opened, last time, we found a postcognitic - one who can psychically comprehend the truth after the fact. He told us that there were three things Buffy needed to do beforehand if she were to have defeated the Fireking on the Winter Solstice. First, destroy the Order of Taraka and their retreat in the Himalayan mountains. Second, obtain the Discus of Demonslaying from the Hall of Heroes. We think that the Discus might be the only weapon that can kill Obayana. Third, she has to find the lost Fortress of the Chosen Ones."
"A tall order indeed," Tojo observed, "but not beyond the abilities of Buffy, with the assistance she can draw upon."
"Yeah," Willow said, "but now she'll never even know to do those things. Let's see, what else - the tunnel route from the mine entrance, down the underground river, and through the old Master's lair, is still the best way we've found into town. Don't try to duplicate the Slay-staff - there's dark magic within it, and using it to defeat evil is tempting fate. Buffy and the others should stay well away from Sunnydale until the night of the solstice - move in quickly, and leave the final plan unformulated until the last moment. Vanessa and the witches here can cover with scrying guard magic to help keep Obayana from anticipating the attack..." Willow broke off here, crying.
Meanwhile, Xander had found the retaining crystal with Jenny's spirit in it, and led Cordelia over to it. "Hi, Willow, it's Jenny," Miss Calendar said with Cordelia's voice. "Why is it that you think we won't remember any of this??"
* * * *
When Xander popped back into Elysium, Buffy was already there, bringing Giles up to speed a little more on the Future Slayerettes from her perspective. "You ready to go?" Xander called out as he arrived.
"Yeppers," Buffy told Xander, looking up at him. "Posessing Spectres are history. In any number of seconds you name, we can get those rings off. How many minutes are left before the deadline?"
"Six or so, I think," Xander said, "but there's no good reason to wait. Willow's calculations might be slightly off, for all we know. And Future-Willow just seems to be getting more upset." Jenny winked back in. "Everything okay, Jenny?"
"Oh, yeah," the technopagan told him. "Just thought I'd rather be back here in Elysium when the timeline collapses. No good reason." She snuck an affectionate arm around Giles.
"Okay. Fifteen seconds?" Xander suggested, then winked out. Counting the seconds off slowly, he walked over to the Future Willow and at the arranged time, slipped the ring off her finger, knowing that Buffy and Willow would be doing the same thing to Future-Xander and Future-Cordelia at exactly the same moment.
In that instant, everything changed.
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