Mist of Shadows
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Xander and the Remote Part 3
🕑 Added 2018-12-03 21:11:40 +0000 UTC Genie smiled as Buffy walked out of the bathroom wearing only a towel while drying her hair with a second one. “Ready for your upgrade?”“Yes, though I have to say I think I enjoyed the costs more than I expected,” Buffy admitted, smiling at her two friends on the couch who had opted for magical cleaning rather than a shower.
“That’s the best type of deal,” Genie agreed as she teleported a small chunk of the alien meteorite to her hand.
“Does this change anything between us?” Willow asked a little nervously.
“What? No,” Buffy assured her then paused. “Well, yes,” she admitted, “but in a good way. Like… we are closer friends now? I can share when I am feeling a bit more hormonal or need some extra hugs.”
Xander nodded, satisfied that they hadn’t screwed things up.
Genie snapped her fingers and laced Buffy’s bones with the meteorite. “That should do it.”
“That’s it?” Buffy asked, not having felt anything.
“That’s it,” Genie agreed, “I could make it painful or orgasmic, but it’s magic and I figured you just wanted it done.”
“That’s fine, I was just expecting… I don’t know what I was expecting really. So, how do we test it out?”
“Monster movie?” Xander suggested.
“Huh?” Buffy asked.
“Right there with you,” Willow added.
“Remember Halloween?” Xander teased.
“The supervillain who tried to make a deal with the vamps and got your legs broken?” Buffy replied with a raised eyebrow,
“Actually he was trying to stall the vamps while figuring out what to do,” Xander replied. “Anyway, long story short, I still have the powers. So, what monster have you always wanted to stomp?”
“Jason?” Buffy asked hopefully.
“Why him?” Xander asked as he started flipping through channels.
“He’s a complete buzzkill and cockblocker,” Buffy complained.
“I hadn’t thought about it that way,” Willow admitted.
“Yep,” Buffy replied then grinned as Xander flipped the channel and she saw a couple women in an upscale underwear and clothing boutique. “Can we make a quick stop first?”
Genie flashed Buffy a smile then looked at Xander with a hopeful expression. “Shopping?”
“Might as well,” Xander agreed, knowing it would make the girls happy.
0o0o0
Genie pulled her attention away from Jason’s diesel soaked dismembered zombie that was ‘happily’ burning in the camp fire pit as the mental alert she’d set up to warn Xander about Jack getting home went off. “We’re going to have to cut this short, Jack is five minutes out and we need to get Buffy and Willow home.”
“Probably just as well,” Buffy agreed. “I want to get my new clothes put away before my mom gets home.”
“If Joyce asks, I had nothing to do with it,” Xander said as he started walking for the ‘portal’ that would take them back to the real world.
“There goes my fiendish plan to toss you under the bus,” Buffy teased.
Xander shook his head. “Joyce hit Spike with an axe, I’d rather not get on her bad side.”
Genie shook her head. “Blah, just tell her that Willow accidently ordered some clothes online and they sent her extra stuff and there is no return address.”
“That’s probably better,” Buffy agreed.
“Certainly safer,” Xander replied as they stepped back into Jack’s living room.
“Not to cut this short but we sort of need to cut this short,” Genie snapped her fingers and teleported Buffy and Willow back to Buffy’s house with their stuff. “I should probably clean up the mess and turn invisible.”
“That would be good,” Xander said as he took a seat on the couch and arranged his crutches so he could get them if he ‘needed’ them.
Genie snapped her fingers, cleaning up the mess and airing everything out so there wasn’t any evidence of their earlier fun then vanished from view as she heard two cars pull into the driveway. “Perfect timing.”
“Cutting it a little close,” Xander whispered as he switched the television back to normal and stuck his special remote in his pocket.
“My alert system could use a bit of tweaking considering the speed of the local vehicles. It was a fair distance on horseback.”
“How many horses do you see around here?” Xander asked sarcastically, fairly sure she was just messing with him.
“Not enough,” Genie said as she took a seat on the back of the couch above Xander so she’d be out of the way.
Xander looked up from the television as he heard the door open. “Jack?”
“And friends,” Jack called out as he walked in followed by Sam, Daniel, and Teal'c.
Genie raised her eyebrows as she looked at Teal’c’s stomach, suddenly glad that she had selectable invisibility. ‘What the hell is that?’ She reached out and scanned the group’s memories to check if they knew Teal’c had a demon inside of him. ‘Huh, alien… Stargate, yeah, I’m going to have to tell Xander about this.’
“Cool,” Xander said as he muted the television and turned to look at his uncle and his friends.
“Hey,” Sam said as she headed for the kitchen to put the drinks in the fridge.
Jack said, “Daniel and Murray, this is my nephew Alexander but everyone calls him Xander.”
“Nice to meet you,” Xander said wondering what Teal’c’s diet was like as he smelled a little off.
“What are you watching?” Daniel asked as Jack headed into the kitchen to help Sam grab snacks.
“I was mostly just flipping channels and seeing if there was anything interesting,” Xander replied as he hit the recall button to pull up the hockey game that he’d marked earlier.
“I’m still not sure I understand the point of this game,” Teal’c admitted as Daniel walked over and sat on the couch.
Xander said, “The point is they hit each other with sticks and occasionally hit the black disk into the net in order to score points.”
“It’s slightly more complicated than that,” Jack called from the kitchen.
“Hockey fan?” Daniel asked Xander, curious what Jack’s nephew was like.
Xander shrugged. “I’m not much of a sports fan but I like hockey more than football. I mostly just hung out with my friends and tried to avoid the various gangs.”
“L.A?”
“Nah, Sunnydale, it’s about an hour from L.A.”
Daniel frowned slightly as the name tugged on a mostly forgotten memory. “That’s unfortunate.”
“They mostly only come out at night so it could be worse,” Xander said, knowing that even most of the demons kept a low profile during the day.
Sam walked out with two beers in her left hand and a large bowl of chips in her other hand. She set the chips on the table then handed Daniel the extra beer.
Xander moved to the edge of the couch so that Sam had enough room to sit down. “So, which team are we betting on?”
“We’re not betting on either of them,” Jack said as he walked into the living room with two beers and a bowl of pretzels. He handed the extra beer to Teal’c then set the bowl on the end table and sat down in his recliner.
Xander twitched slightly as a post it note appeared in his hand. He frowned slightly as he read the note. ‘Murray is a Jaffa, an alien.’ He looked over at Teal’c. “Where are Jaffa from?”
Jack twitched. “Jaffa?”
Xander looked down at the post it note as it twitched in his hand and the writing changed. “Oh that was a secret. Sorry, my bad. So who do you think is going to win?”
Sam looked over at Jack. “He is certainly your nephew,” she said as Xander relaxed on the couch and pretended he hadn’t just dropped a major bomb in the last few seconds.
“Where did you hear that?” Jack asked warily.
“Classified?” Xander offered, hopefully.
Jack shook his head.
“Hmm, I wish I had a neuralyzer right about now and some sunglasses,” Xander said reaching into his pocket for the aforementioned items and was rewarded with the two items in question. He put on the sunglasses and pulled out the neuralizer, before getting up and moving in front of the TV. “Ok, now I’ve never used one of these before, so give me a moment. Hey, Murray I’m going to need you to open your eyes.”
“I do not think so,” Murray said. “I know of the neuralyzer and do not wish to have my memory tampered with.”
“Come on, it’s not like it could be a real device,” Jack said with a snort, slightly amused at the joke but still planning on interrogating his nephew.
“Exactly, listen to the nice man,” Xander said as he carefully adjusted the dial. “Dammit I thought it’d be in English… I’m not sure which one is minutes and which one is months.”
“Well, if you’re going to erase our memories anyway, how about answering the question?” Jack asked.
“Well I noticed Murray smelled a little funny, no offense, but not quite right,” Xander explained as he tried to figure out which was the more likely setting to use for short time periods, “so Genie, my genie, slipped me a note saying he was a Jaffa, and an alien, which I took to mean he was here on a Visa not a spaceship. Do you think three dots and a squiggle means more or less than a triangle and an emoji of a dog peeing?”
Daniel held out his hand. “Let me see, I’m a linguist.”
“Do you really expect me to fall for that?” Xander asked.
“Considering some of the people I’ve met, you’d be surprised,” Daniel replied with a touch of amusement.
“Ok, and where is this is so called genie?” Jack asked dryly.
Genie turned visible standing next to Xander with an arm around his waist. “I think that setting would reduce them to mentally about five years of age.”
“Who are you? What are you? How did you get in here?” Jack said suddenly taking matters seriously.
“He already told you,” Genie pointed out. “Do you want me to handle it?” she asked Xander. “I trust my magic more than some weird alien gizmo.”
“Magic?” Sam asked warily.
Xander shook his head. “Not particularly, let’s see if we can hash things out. What’s the deal with Murray anyways?”
Genie shrugged. “He’s an alien that used to work for some insane crazy aliens that pretend to be gods and Jack and his team jump through a large portal device in an attempt to stop them from destroying the world or causing too many problems.”
“Where did you get your information and where are your clothes?!” Sam demanded, making all the guys realize the girl was naked.
“Way to ruin my modified notice me not field,” Genie complained with a huff.
“How did she see through it?” Xander asked.
“I set it so girls could see through it, I figured I could tease Willow.”
“Gotcha,” Xander said, “that would be hilarious, especially if we did it in the library with Giles there.”
“How did you turn invisible?” Sam asked, not seeing a device.
“Magic,” Genie replied with amusement.
“That still doesn’t explain how you got here,” Jack said.
“Xander brought me, I’m his genie.”
“As in three wishes?” Daniel asked.
“More I Dream of Jeannie than Aladdin. Thankfully I don’t have a neutered sexless piece of trash for a master.” Genie scowled as she thought about the idiot from the show.
“You really don’t like Tony, do you?” Jack asked dryly.
“He denied his genie much affection,” Murray pointed out, still keeping his eyes closed, “it was very cruel of him.”
“Exactly,” Genie agreed. “You spend a couple centuries with no one to talk to or touch and see how you like being held at arm’s length and derided for doing what comes naturally!”
“He was a dick,” Xander agreed.
“No a dick is warm and capable of providing pleasure, that man was a dildo that someone had stuck in the freezer!”
“Would you like to stop by and visit her for a threesome?” Xander asked giving her a hug, neuralizer forgotten, which Sam quickly snatched out of his hand.
“That would be nice,” Genie agreed. “That poor girl has the worst luck in masters and her bottle…” She got a thoughtful look on her face and quickly changed the subject. “Of course I can’t use my magic to take you to her because that would be breaking the rules.”
“I can handle that part,” Xander assured her.
“I think this thing is real,” Sam said already having examined the item and taken it half apart to neutralize it.
Xander sighed. “So, yeah… Magic is real, the universe is stranger than you know… Do I have to explain the different levels of reality and such to you? Cause I kinda suck at that.”
“Magic isn’t real,” Sam said absently.
“Just consider it shorthand for reality alteration caused by beings and energy from different dimensions,” Xander explained.
“That makes sense,” Sam agreed. “I think this thing is calibrated wrong. Daniel can you come over here for a moment?”
“Sam, no experimenting on your co-workers,” Jack reminded her.
“What?” She shook her head. “Sorry sir. I wanted him to see if he recognized the symbols.”
“Later,” Daniel agreed.
Jack pulled his attention off the naked girl’s behind. “OK, let’s all sit down and have a beer and get her some clothes please.”
“Master do you think I need clothes?” Genie asked with a pout.
“No but it might help the rest of us concentrate,” Xander admitted, taking pity on his uncle.
“Fair enough,” Genie agreed as she snapped her fingers and conjured a red silk dress that left little to the imagination. “Okay, Master.”
“Try again,” Jack ordered, fairly sure she was just messing with them.
Genie stuck her tongue out at Jack as she changed her dress to match Sam’s jeans and a t-shirt. “Have you found anything interesting through the Stargate?”
“You realize that we can’t officially confirm or deny anything, right?” Jack asked.
“So, that’s a no?” Xander asked with amusement.
“Where did you run into ‘magic’?” Sam asked, curious where Xander had run into someone that used higher dimensional energy or had enough tech to fake it.
“Here and there,” Xander said, not seeing a reason to tell them about the supernatural as it was being handled.
“Can you bring back the dead?” Daniel asked.
“Do zombies count?” Genie asked.
“That sounds unpleasant,” Daniel admitted as he twisted the cap off his beer.
“Are you from Earth?” Sam asked.
“Yep, we like to keep a low profile these days,” Genie said as she levitated a couple pretzels to her hand.
Jack raised his eyebrows. “You call this low profile?”
“You’re family and they’re your friends, you’re allowed to know. The rest of Stargate command or the government, not so much.”
“Let me guess, neuralyzers all around if we tell people?” Daniel asked.
“Considering how badly various governments have screwed up in the past when it came to the supernatural, that’s the least of what would happen. Genies tend to react really badly when people threaten our masters.”
“How badly?” Jack asked, thinking of some of the idiots in the NID.
“You’ve heard of Pompeii, right?” Genie asked, perfectly willing to pretend that the eruption had been caused by a genie if it convinced them that leaving Xander alone was a good thing.
“Yeah, that’s more than a little terrifying,” Jack agreed.
“I can’t believe the government doesn’t know about this,” Sam complained.
“Who says they don’t?” Genie asked, using her magic to quickly look up the information. “Just because you have clearance for one secret project doesn’t mean you have clearance for all of them. That and they decided messing with the supernatural was a really bad idea back in World War 2. The current procedure is to deny the existence of anything supernatural and discredit anyone that doesn’t get the hint.”
Daniel frowned as he thought about the various people that had tried to warn him about spreading theories without proof. “That’s what Giles was trying to warn me about,” he muttered.
“Giles?” Jack asked.
“Rupert Giles, used to be the curator for the British Museum of natural history.”
“Used to be?” Sam asked.
“Yeah, he quit a couple years ago to work as school librarian…” he stared at Xander as he remembered where he’d heard the name Sunnydale before, “in Sunnydale California.”
“Small world,” Xander said innocently.
“Let get this straight, a respected curator for the British Museum of Natural History, quits and takes a job in the middle of nowhere and he just happens to have a student with a genie?”
“Completely unrelated, these things happen,” Xander said even though he knew that wasn’t remotely believable.
“Yeah, not buying it,” Jack complained.
Genie snickered. “I wouldn’t either.”
“So what type of wishes can you grant?” Daniel asked, figuring he could track down Giles’ number later.
“Most things other than world wide changes, bringing back the dead, and revealing the existence of magic. None of those end well and I’d rather avoid the attention.”
“Attention from what?” Sam asked.
Genie shivered as she thought about some of the gods that would react badly to magic getting discovered. “Things that are a lot higher up the power scale than I am.”
“Gods?” Daniel asked.
“Gods, demon lords, elder genies, sleeping… things,” she replied, “the list goes on and on.”
“I’d think a genie would be pretty high on the list of powerful things,” Sam argued.
“You’re still thinking about Aladdin’s genie. My powers aren’t nearly as impressive, but then I’m not limited to only three wishes either.”
Xander said. “Which is probably a good thing, trying to figure out three perfect wishes would probably drive me a little insane.”
“Jafar’s first wish was of decent tactical design,” Teal’c spoke up.
“The rest of his wishes were crap but the first one was good,” Jack agreed.
“Yeah, sadly that falls under the things I can’t grant but a decent choice considering the options,” Genie agreed.
Jack looked down at the ankle wrap Xander was wearing. “If you have a genie, why are you still injured?”
“Too many people saw me get injured. I had her fix the injury and the records.”
“In other words, we shouldn’t harass the doctor for gross incompetence?” Sam asked.
“I’d rather you didn’t, considering what they have to deal with,” Xander replied as he removed the bandage.
‘What they have to deal with?’ Jack thought, ‘Yeah, I need to look into Sunnydale.’
“Hypothetically, if we had a group of parasitic aliens that were scattered around the galaxy pretending to be gods, how would you deal with it?”
“Hypothetically? What are my resources?” Xander asked, not sure what they were working with.
Genie conjured a folder. “Here, this should be easier.”
Xander spend a minute glancing over the report on the stargate and the SGC. “The first step is to build an alpha site so that you’re not leading them back here. After that, I’d want to figure out a way to enhance the people you’re sending through the gate. Probably a way to get some better intelligence on the various snakes and work on reverse engineering things.”
“Enhancement?” Jack asked.
“Increased strength and reaction time or durability. I’d also want a sarcophagus for reviving the dead or seriously injured.”
“If we knew where to find a sarcophagus, we’d happily steal one,” Jack said.
“Hypothetically of course,” Sam added. “Performance enhancers are dangerous.”
“The stuff that we can make with Earth science, sure. I have a way to enhance a couple people significantly, but I can probably find something to provide regular safe enhancement for an entire base but you’d need a decent chemist to take credit for the formula,” Xander said, thinking of the serum that Poison Ivy gave Harley. “Plant based, so I’m not sure how you’ll cover that when I get it to you. The military has botanists, right?”
“Wouldn’t that be revealing magic?” Sam asked.
“No,” Xander said, “this is actual scientific stuff you can take apart and play with, at least the plant based stuff is, the better enhancement stuff, not so much.”
“And that wouldn’t be a problem?” Jack asked.
“You’re exposed to a lot of things off world, the doctors would think mad science, not magic so that’s really not a concern. Just don’t let them remove any limbs and it’ll be fine.”
“That sounds like a terrible idea,” Daniel agreed.
“Good, now this is your whole team right?” Xander asked.
“Yeah,” Jack agreed.
“Genie?” Xander asked.
Genie frowned slightly as she looked at Teal’c. “We need to fix his pouch thing first and get rid of the snake, maybe drop it in a jungle on an empty world somewhere if you don’t want to cook and eat it.”
“He needs it for his immune system,” Sam pointed out. “The… snakes, altered his people so that they would need to carry a larva after puberty to help control them and prevent rebellions.”
“Nah, the stuff will cover that and then some,” Genie said, “besides we have to alter his DNA a bit to remove the pouch and fixing his immune system at the same time isn’t a problem. Who wants to become blood brothers with him?”
Genie snickered as the rest of Teal’c’s team said yes or raised their hands slightly at the same time. “That works,” she said with a grin. “Ok, I’ll choose by using the ancient and highly regarded method called… eenie meanie miny moe… nah, okay, I’ll just use a bit from everyone.” She tweaked Teal’c’s DNA to include Jack and Xander’s ancient gene, a bit from Daniel for flexibility and some from Sam because she had absolutely gorgeous skin.
“First step done,” she said.
“Your eyes look a little closer to Daniel’s in shade,” Samantha noticed.
“Skin looks a little smoother,” Daniel added.
“Same basic you, just add teammates,” Jack said. “Pouch still there?”
Teal’c lifted his shirt to check and noticed that his pouch was gone. “Doctor Fraiser is going to notice.”
“Where did the snake go?” Jack asked warily.
“I sent it to an uninhabited world. Not sure how well it’ll do with the crocodiles and all, but it has a chance,” she said with a shrug.
“Wouldn’t that count as killing someone?”
“I’m not the Aladdin genie,” she reminded them, “If Xander wishes I could slaughter thousands. Thankfully we are both more make love not war types.
“That’s for the best,” Daniel agreed, knowing that a lot of people would have let having a genie go to their heads.
“Step two,” Genie said as she snapped her fingers and laced the team’s bones with some of the alien meteorite. “That should do it.” She turned to look at Xander. “Step three is up to you. Everything should be set up.” She snapped her fingers and teleported him into the bedroom where the television was set up with a tape of an episode of Batman where Poison Ivy really needed someone to love her.
“Where did you send him?” Jack asked warily.
“Somewhere he can pick up the formula. You’re going to want to be careful, you’re a lot stronger than you used to be.”
“Define a lot,” Daniel requested.
“You can lift at least a small car,” Genie looked at Teal’c. “Maybe a mid sized sedan.”
“Not with my knees,” Jack snorted.
“Shouldn’t be a problem,” Genie replied.
Jack bent his knees then bent them more, rather surprised that there wasn’t even a twinge. “You weren’t joking were you?”
“Nope,” Genie said smugly.
“Side effects?” Sam asked.
“Long life, good health, happiness, the usual.”
“How much of a boost is the other formula?”
Genie shrugged. “It’s not exactly Spiderman level but you could sweep the olympics and survive most poisons without a problem.”
“In other words, useful for a team traveling to other worlds,” Jack agreed as he reached down and carefully picked up the end table, noticing how light the solid wooden table felt. “That’s new.”
Sam frowned. “We should probably head outside to test our new abilities.”
“Yeah, I’d rather not have to remodel the house,” Jack agreed as he headed for the back door.
0o0o0
Comments
Mist of Shadows
I'm having a lot of fun with it.
Melissa Francis
I love this. Can't wait to see more. Can't wait to see where you go with this. If it is anything like your others it will be awsome. :)
Mist of Shadows
Mostly it was a yeah, sure, okay you can do what? Prove it moment and he's Jack's nephew. Also the understanding that there is really shit all they can do about it anyways. If she's what he claims then she's basically an ascended or something and yeah...
Ryune
Um... So not to be a major complainer or anything but aren't they a little too accepting of all of this? I mean, yeah, I get them buying his explanations as given, at least temporarily, but they all just submitted to an untested medical procedure by a mostly unknown in the company of a largely unknown individual.
