592Chapter 23
*KRAKOOM!*
Thunder and lightning rocked the entirety of heaven for a mere second. But a second was all it needed due to the intensity.
"LISTEN UP DILL HOLES!" The booming voice flooded the realm. It then continued, still loud, just less 'boomy'. "Effective immediately, this dimension is under my control on the authority of the Aspects and Existence. You will lay down your weapons immediately or I will end you."
"Dill holes?" Dean was grinning with glee at Xander.
"Miya might not have a go at me for my language, but it doesn't stop the others." Xander pouted.
"Especially as we are in 'Heaven'." Clark said smugly.
"Shut up and go smite the idiots who didn't do as they were told." Xander grumbled.
Clark vanished silently leaving Xander there with Dean, Sam, Bobby and Aphrodite.
He was shortly replaced by Gabriel. "I've had my people herd as many of the souls as they can to The Garden." He reported. "Unless you say otherwise, most of my people will stay put and watch over them until you give the all-clear. We are send search parties out to try and locate more souls."
"Someone's bucking for the big chair." Dean snarked quietly… but loud enough for everyone to hear.
"Well, if he wants it, he'll get it." Xander shrugged. "He's shown his true colours. If he doesn't want it, and can't recommend someone to take the position then I'll fill it with someone I know."
"Who?" Sam asked curiously.
Xander looked thoughtful. "Either Venus or Aphrodite from Logan's world. They like to take turns running their combined realms."
"Erm..."
"Gabe?" Dean asked the worried archangel.
"Just give them an enforcer like Big Blue out there." He referred to Clark. "We angels have always been a bit high and mighty with other gods and their followers. Chances are someone will open their mouths and prove angels are just as stupid as everyone else. I can see the terms 'bitch' and 'whore' being heard."
Xander grinned. "I know just the guy. They really wouldn't want to make him angry."
Aphrodite giggled at the slight look of terror that slipped in the eyes of her current companions.
"But he's definitely not an 'absent father' the way you use the term. No, he always makes time for me, Baldur and Kal."
Buffy just nodded politely as she was dragged through the halls of Valhalla by Thor. She had no idea what she was supposed to do or say, she was in the presence of a princess… a goddess. She wasn't sure if she was allowed to disagree.
That said, she wouldn't know what to say or even if she wanted to disagree. She was still trying work out if this 'adoption' deal was part of some ancient Norse ritual.
"Hmmph... you aren't actually listening to me, are you?"
Buffy realised they had stopped. She was clearly in someone's bedroom and sitting on their bed. Thor was sitting on her desk chair.
The room looked very… '20th century Western Earth'.
"I was!" Buffy lied quickly. "You were talking… about, your dad… Asgard… stuff?"
Thor rolled her eyes, pulled Buffy off the bed and dragged her off.
Twenty minutes later, after heading through the Asgardian Portal door, Thor pushed a thoroughly exhausted and confused Buffy towards Kusano.
"She doesn't need a father. She just needs support and love." Thor lectured the May Queen. "Buffy, if you want to come visit, then just do it. No airs or graces. Just walk through the portal and tell 'em Thor sent you.
"You will always be welcome and you had better come and visit." Thor then pulled the large sword off her back, unsheathing it in one swing. "Now, if you will excuse me, I have a father and sister to instruct on the correct way to act when coming back from the dead."
She marched out of Kusano's room, the door slamming shut behind her.
"Father and si-"
"Xander and Luna." Ku answered. "Thor is Clark's sister which makes Xander her dad and Luna her sister."
"Oh." Buffy said quietly.
"Of course, she also considers Harry her dad as he helped make her. That would make Xander her grandfather as well."
Buffy flopped back onto the bed and covered her face, sobbing dramatically.
"Listen to me very carefully, Father, and understand what I am saying."
Xander frowned. Luna never called him 'Father'.
"Caleb is being passed around from hell to hell. It has been decided that he will never die and will suffer for eternity."
Buffy's eyes widened as she saw Xander actually pale with fear. His eyes turned yellow.
"Father! He is secure! He cannot hurt you!" Luna was holding by the shoulders as he was seated in a chair.
His breathing was becoming ragged.
Buffy hated this. Even before the whole merging of Xander's, the friendly teen had been steadily and unflinching by her side. Now he was clearly having a panic attack.
She needed to do something to help. She closed her eyes and hope that she could not only do what she planned, but that it was the right thing to do.
Buffy heard the sound of blades being drawn. She opened her eyes and saw that they were no longer in the Mansion. They were on an island. Surrounded by women in togas. All holding swords or spears.
Luna was still standing in front of the seated Xander.
"Sebastos! Luna!" Came a startled cry from the women.
"Stand guard and protect Xander and Luna." Buffy shouted out.
There was a brief pause before they complied. Not many of them were familiar with Buffy. They all knew Xander and Luna though.
Unfortunately, the added security and change of locale had no effect on Xander.
"Alright girls, I've got this. Luna stand aside."
Buffy sighed in pure relief as Tess marched up to the seated Xander.
Then she watched in disbelief.
Tess began to dance. Slowly. Seductively.
Then she started to strip.
She was wearing the traditional Amazonian toga so it was more that she let the piece of cloth gently and slowly slide down her body revealing-
"Hehehe boobies."
Buffy began to simmer on the spot, she was surprised when the Amazons began to giggle.
"Alright girls, Tess has managed to reboot him. We can leave them to it." Helen Luthor called out with a smile.
The rest of the Amazons began teleporting out leaving Luna, Buffy and the black haired Amazon with the now naked Tess starting to strip the wildly grinning Xander.
Buffy was now turning red for a different reason.
"Come on girls, let's get you back to the others."
Buffy took the opportunity to turn her back on the porno taking place a few feet away.
"Nice work Buffy." Luna smiled happily as she bounced up and latched onto Buffy's arm.
"Yeah… thanks… what happens when Xander remembers what you told him?" She asked as she desperately tried to ignore what the wet noises behind her meant… she hoped it was just kissing.
Helen put an arm around Luna and led them off. "Tess will just keep distracting him. If it doesn't work then some of the telepaths will do some work on him to help him handle the terror."
"Has he ever been this bad before?" Buffy asked, she was wringing her hands and trying not to look over her shoulder to check on her friend… she didn't need to see what she thought she'd see.
"He has always had nightmares." Helen nodded. "Apparently, his first wives, Nym and Fleur, along with Tess and Fawkes helped keep them at bay."
"How?"
"Fawkes and Fleur had natural gifts that could soothe his mind and soul. Nym and Tess have to rely on monitoring charms. They alert and wake them as Xander's vitals indicate the start of a night terror."
"Night terror?"
"Take your worst nightmare. You wake up from it and you realise it wasn't real. With night terrors you can't tell the difference."
It was two days later that another meeting took place in the mansion.
It would have been longer but Harry got impatient and conjured an arctic storm over a certain beach of Themiscyra. Xander and Tess were not amused.
Everyone else was.
"Alright, starting at the top." Clark began, chairing the meeting as usual. "Heaven is now free of hostilities. Unfortunately, it's population of angels is down by a fifth."
"Great Kal-El!" Clark tried not to glare at Aphrodite at her quiet and reverent exclamation. "That is twenty million beings. Dead."
"Twenty mill'?" Dean asked with a frown.
"Revelation chapter five verse eleven." A quiet and sombre Gabriel spoke up. "'Then I looked up and heard the voice of many angels, numbering thousands upon thousands, and ten thousand times ten thousand.'" He looked at Dean with utter disgust, although the sentiment was not directed at Xander's Champion. "It's just basic math."
"The number is a lot higher than that." Clark corrected. "But regardless of the actual number, far too many people died for an ideal."
"Not that there is a problem with that." Xander said quickly. He tapped his finger on the table pensively. "Many of us have given our all for an ideal. Usually it's for the freedom and safety of the innocent. Other people believe just as firmly in their own ideals. Whether it be that of differing religions and cultures seeking mutual or otherwise annihilation or women believing men are all bad." He finished with a grin at Tess.
"Just certain ones, Hun." The aforementioned Amazon sent a poisonous glare at her son-in-law.
Harry had one of those 'butter won't melt in his mouth' looks.
"Yeah… so Heaven is in mourning." Gabriel bitterly brought them back to the topic at hand. "I am not a leader. You'll need to set one up before that power vacuum becomes too tempting."
"Don't you know any other 'Christian gods' from other dimensions?" Willow asked Harry curiously. "Couldn't they help?"
Harry smiled but shook his head. "Remember how you felt when Mum and Dad got merged with their older souls. You were extremely distrustful of them and didn't really want to be around them.
"If I was to bring in another God from a different universe then the angels would be really offended. A doppelgänger would be replacing their king and father.
"At the moment I am thinking of asking either Aphrodite's brother, Apollo, or my son or daughter, Sif or Heimdall, to take the position."
"If I die, I want to go to the afterlife." Buffy said with wide worried eyes.
"Buffy?" Joyce queried her daughter.
"I've met his son." She glared at Harry. "I don't want to spend eternity with my head at a right angle to the rest of my body!"
Xander chuckled. "Buff, first of all, that's your nephew you're talking about. Second of all, you are immortal and invulnerable. You are soul bound to Luna who is soul bound to Harry.
"The only person who can kill you is Harry… or your new best friend; Existence.
"Third of all… you do realise you can fly? Right?"
They were surprised when Emma started laughing. "I'm sorry, I was remembering all those years ago when Harry first barged into our lives. He made a comment about Pixie using her wings to reach high shelves."
There was a pause as everyone looked at Buffy curiously. Then they laughed as Buffy was oblivious to their looks, she was lost in thought, clearly realising the full potential of her new wings.
Even after realising everyone was laughing, she still didn't realise she was reason. Probably a good thing for them.
"Alright, so Heaven is still a work in progress but at least the fighting has stopped." Scott spoke up after they had calmed themselves. "Clark? Next?"
"Earth is now out of its home universe." Clark continued. "Now we just have to… clear up." He finished with distaste.
"Already done." Buffy said with quiet solemnness.
There was a stunned silence.
"Buffy… are you saying that… in your capacity as the Voice of Existence… you destroyed your home universe?" Harry asked hesitantly. He made sure to use Buffy's 'official' title so that no one would rashly jump to conclusions.
Buffy didn't look up from the table. "Destroying parts of Existence… it hurts. It knows and understands, but it still hurts.
"I don't have massive magical abilities like Harry. I didn't do it myself. I just… comforted Existence as they did it themselves.
"It was horrible."
"Good work kid."
Buffy looked across to Gabriel with confused and wet eyes.
"I've just spent the past thousand or so years killing my own family." The Archangel explained. "Then Superman there goes and finishes the job.
"So for the last few days I've been trying to console and comfort my siblings over the loss of our family."
"Buff, next time, just have Existence coordinate with me." Harry said gently but firmly. "I'll do the nasty work you do the comforting. I'm used to causing this type of pain." He said with self-loathing.
"Methinks that could be the reason Existence did it herself." Luna piped in sarcastically.
"Next." Scott prodded before a sibling spat could evolve. It was bad enough when Neville and Harry got into it, nobody wanted to see what Luna would do.
"Earth." Clark quickly jumped on the opening. "Chaos would be putting it politely."
"People are rioting everywhere." Willow was clearly scared by the current events. This was pretty much the apocalypse.
"And the death toll…?" Neville verbally prodded her with a smile.
The fear was replaced with confusion. Then thought. Back to confusion.
"No one's died."
"Exactly. However, anyone who tries to kill someone else or hurt them winds up in a cell." Neville smiled at her.
"There's a lot of magic involved." Scott said wearily.
"We still need to deal with the unrest." Amara pushed. "We are saving lives but not minds… or society and civilisation."
"I vote for the Nuclear Option." Dani grinned.
"Hell yeah! They want to complain… let's give them a reason to complain." Kyla agreed from beside her friend.
"Nuclear War?!" Willow was aghast.
"No Wills." Faith said a little cattily. "Nuclear Option is just a name. It means they are going straight for the last option."
"How do you know?" Buffy asked curiously.
The dark haired former Potential blushed. "I've been talking to the Bruces." She mumbled.
"Smart girl you've got there, Logan." Lois smirked at The Wolverine.
Said mutant just managed to look proud without losing his usual grumpiness.
It didn't matter. Faith's week could not get any better.
"What is the last resort?" Tara asked.
"At the moment we have invaded and are occupying." Laura said as she tapped her finger on the table, it was a hint of agitation. "The last resort means we go from occupying and just trying to maintain the peace along with ensuring life goes on, and now we enforce our will."
"There's no such thing as utopia." Faith muttered.
"That's what Mr Wayne and Mr Banner told us when we first met." Tara explained. "Everyone's idea of paradise is different. You can't please everyone unless you make them want what you want them to want."
"First of all, the girl's banned from any word games if she can pull off that sentence." Gabriel said sardonically. "Second of all, there are ways around that. Heaven isn't a single world. Everyone has their own version of paradise. Sometimes people with the same desires share their heaven."
"Why wouldn't that work on Earth?" Sam asked curiously.
"Procreation." Gabriel said simply. "You can have all the sex you want in heaven… but you can't make babies. If you tried to turn Earth into Heaven then in say… a hundred years you'd have rebellions occurring in at least a thousand individual paradises. Children don't always agree with their parents. Case in point, Lucifer and Dad."
"Ok, but let's get back to the here and now." Buffy said a little impatiently. "What are you going to do to 'enforce your will?"
"Clark goes out and faces the population of the planet. He then holds up Willow with one hand and tells them that if they don't do as we say… Willow will give them… 'resolve face'."
Everyone looked at Xander with calm, unimpressed looks. "Not buying it?"
"Aphrod-"
"I'll be good!"
"Relax Father." The Goddess of Love smiled at him. "I would never use my special shoes on you. No matter what my brother-in-law wants." She glared at Scott.
Xander looked very relieved.
"Tess, I need you to cut Xander off."
Xander was horrified.
Tess didn't look too happy. "Yes Goddess." She said somewhat morosely.
No one actually believe Tess would do it or that Aphrodite meant it. Let's face it; Aphrodite might be Tess' goddess, but… Tess was Aphrodite's mother-in-law.
"And the real definition?" Giles generally remained silent in these meetings, he felt very… useless and in awe.
"We institute the abolition of money for food, health care, education and living accommodation." Neville explained. "Everyone is entitled to food, medicine, education and roof to live under. We provide a basic set. A diet which is in keeping with the country, culture and religion of the family. If people want to have fancy food like expensive wine or caviar, they pay for it.
"Any medicine required for a person to live without pain, suffering or fear is free. Personal augmentations that are not related to actual medical needs will be paid for by the patient. But, if the surgery is required due to a deeply rooted psychological problem that counsellors can't help with, it's free.
"Erm…"
"Education." Scott supplied for Neville.
"Right, everyone is taught the same basics up to a certain age. The three R's are a must."
"Reading, writing and replacing calculator batteries." Harry declared firmly. "What? It's not like 'writing' starts with an 'r'." He pouted at the exasperated looks he was getting.
"They will also learn basic science." Neville continued smoothly. "Along with recent history and geography. Those two are usually combined. Later in their school life they can begin to focus on specific subjects and even add them. Music, art, sports, if they have an idea of what they want to do then we'll tailor their education to fit them.
"Finally, accommodation. You've seen Clark's Earth. We can create sky scrapers that would house an entire city but still only take up the space of say, a standard block of flats."
"Apartments."
"What?"
"They're yanks, they say 'apartments'."
"Focus!"
Harry grinned as Neville looked at him with annoyance. Joyce just sighed.
"Anyway, everyone is given a residence. All residences are the same and may be customised by the residents to fit their culture.
"Anyone who wants to live in big fancy mansions pays hefty rent to the government." Neville said, gesturing at the mansion they were sitting in.
"And you think that's gonna work? On this planet?" Dean asked with a snort.
"We've done it before on worse planets." Lorna spoke up. "Our universe was filled with government sanctioned and enforced racism across the world. We had just fended off an alien invasion and prevented another.
"We had megalomaniacs bent on world domination… and they had the means and power to do it.
"This planet has just its tendons cut. The populace that complains will be the equivalent of medieval peasants with nothing but rotten tomatoes for weapons."
"I've been attacked by peasants with rotten tomatoes." Gabriel mused. He then looked fairly pissed. "I still regret not smiting the lot of them."
"Ok, now what about the people who try to instigate rebellion?" Sam asked. "It's gonna happen, probably already is."
"They get locked up." Harry shrugged. "On their release, if they are still a threat, we put them on an isolated island with like-minded fools. We simply arrest them when they do it there."
"Kid, any chance I can get a decade long vacation in another universe?" Bobby stage whispered across to Xander.
Xander just grinned. "You remember how time flows differently?"
"Shit."
"Relax. Everyone take a deep breath and relax." Jean said soothingly. "Try to remember that we have done this many times. There will be problems. People will suffer and probably die. But at the end of the day, they won't be tortured and used by demons."
There was a few moments silence.
"I'm on board." Faith piped up.
"I'm with the kid." Dean added with a thumbs up at Faith.
Faith just glared at him.
"Seriously? You goddamned idjit, you can even bum out with an under aged girl you ain't even hittin' on?" Bobby demanded.
"Anything else we need to cover?" Buffy asked, looking to Clark.
"Nothing that won't take us into the quicksand that is 'micro-managing'." Clark chuckled.
"Good. 'Cause I've got something to raise." Buffy said as she held up her hand, a colourful book appeared in her hand. A hardback.
She placed it face down on the table and slid it across to Faith.
The dark haired girl picked it up curiously and looked at the cover. She shot a wide eyed yet wary glance at Buffy before she started flicking through the first few pages.
She looked back at Buffy, eyes still wide but looking like all her birthdays and Christmases had come at once.
"That's hitting the shelves next week." Buffy smirked.
"What is it?" Xander asked curiously.
"Dad, check it out." Faith ignored him as she slid the book to Logan.
Logan glared at her, still uncomfortable with her chosen title for him, but secretly enjoying it.
He picked up the book and looked at the cover. The shock was clear… although it took everyone a few seconds identify the rarely seen look on Old Man Logan's face.
Like Faith, he flicked through the first few pages.
He then turned to Buffy and laughed. "Great work girl." He then tossed the book at the wall behind him, enlarging it and making it stick to the wall.
"Oh sweet Merlin." Neville groaned.
There it was. A first edition British copy of the soon to be released children's book; Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.
"Mother fu-"
"Language Harry!"
The End
A/N: This is the end of this saga. I have no intention of writing the continuing adventures of Harry and the gang, but, I would like to go back and continue Death's Little Brother.
I didn't actually come up with the 'jumping the multi-verse' plot line until half-way through Potter's Protector. But as soon as I did I wrote the epilogue with the vague allusion to Jean. As soon as I finished writing the epilogue (even though I hadn't finished the story) I knew I wanted to end the series with the gang heading to Sunnydale.
As always I only give reviews a very cursory glance... mainly to make sure I haven't posted the wrong chapter... which I have done before. Reviews are always a crap shoot. Yes, people will tell you what they like, more so what they want. But perhaps more often, people like to troll and be mean. I'm not talking about criticism, I'm talking about hateful vitriol.
So, I ignore reviews and pay attention to the followers and favs. That said, I used to read reviews, I felt a good deal of schadenfreude when reading that I got people in trouble for laughing at work or snorting their drinks over their keyboards.
Thanks for reading... next up... Harry finds himself back in time... what does he miss the most? Pubic hair.