While You Were Sleeping
by Kelly Smith
Rating: NC-17
Author's Notes: I'm slacking on the updates again. I know this. Will try and be quicker.
Dedicated: AR-SENAL... AR-SENAL... AR-SENAL...
We are mighty and strong. And in the semi-finals of the Champions League.
I love the Arse.
Enjoy :)
The basement collapsed into silence as Giles finally took the time to run his eyes fully over the girl that he had so long ago bidden a farewell to. Never expecting to have her standing in front of him again, never suspecting that she would wake from something that had seemed so solid in its finality. In the beginning he had been concerned, had kept almost as keen an eye as Buffy on the patient. Not a first hand eye though, he was not one for the personal visits; but he had kept himself well informed on the situation.
He knew what the doctors had said. He waited for the slayer healing to kick in and prove them wrong. And after over a year of waiting, he accepted that nothing was going to heal the coma that seemed never ending. At Buffy’s death he had wondered again…
Silent meanderings he would never share with the youth of the group, just private thoughts… would Faith awake? Could she be the slayer that they so desperately needed? But no. That was one time when he did stop by to see her in person, observing the monotone beeping of the machines, observing the pale listlessness he would never ever have associated with Faith. She would never wake up. He had been certain of that.
“So what’s the what, you just come to stare, or you got something to say?”
That same voice edged with roughness, reminding him that even certainties were never really certain. That sometimes events could never be determined before they came to pass. Sobering thoughts indeed for a man who resided his mind in prophesies and predictions.
“I was hoping Faith, that we might discuss how you’re feeling. How your healing is coming along. Buffy tells me that you‘re getting stronger…”
“Does she?”
And Faith couldn’t give a crap about anything he had to say, any way he had to look at her. Look down on her. All of Faith’s focus was routing around the Watcher to hone in on her prey. The day’s first *real* glance, the moment’s first look. Not dipping green, not tinting pinks; eyes wide open. Gaze straight ahead.
“Yes. I have to say you’re looking much better than when we first left Sunnydale.”
“I heard I caught the last bus outta town. Way Andrew tells it, I’d be at the bottom of a rubble pit if I hadn’t woken up then. Timing’s a bitch, huh?”
Words which made him stutter on a breath, toss a look Buffy’s way before he met her eyes again. “We didn’t know that events were going to become quite so destructive Faith, obviously had we been prepared, we would have…”
“Made sure you tied me to the bed before you flew the coop? Damn, bet my arrival’s messed up the old victory parade.” She hardened her eyes as another of those disappointed looks made its way to Giles’ face. Letting the smile raise sarcastic across her lips as she offered sweet sentiments. “Least this way we all get to bury the hatchet and start fresh, right? Can’t wait to be buddies again G-man, it’ll be just like old times - gotta say the cage is a step down from my old apartment, probably got the nod over the motel though.”
Remember the motel Giles? Shit no. Giles only went to Buffy’s house to wine and dine. The idea of eating crap out of a takeout carton while sitting on a flea infested bed, had never really appealed to him. Least that’s the way that Faith saw it. Never had any tales to tell it different.
“Faith, Giles is here to try and help. Maybe you could strap down the attitude and give him a chance?”
She let her eyes linger longer this time. Pretending at considering, pretending she gave a fuck whether Buffy was happy or not. There was in fact only one feeling that Faith wanted Buffy to feel, and it was nowhere close to happy. Nothing to do with smiling. “Sure, carry on Giles. You left me for dead, we’ll call it bygones. So how have you been?”
“Let’s focus on how you’ve been Faith. I can see your charm and wit are back in spades, what about physically? Buffy mentioned that you still bore the scar from…”
Say it Giles. Say it.
“…the *incident* before graduation.”
“The incident? What incident was that?”
“I trust you know full well what I am referring to. Have you noticed any fading yet, has your slayer healing hastened the progress since you woke up?”
She caught his eyes in a stare and waited for him to look away. Running the knife through her head again, running the knife through her side again. Only he didn’t look away, he pinned her with as much focus as she had hoped to discomfort him with. Feeling her own skin itching, her own defences being tested…
“Yeah.”
“Yes what?”
Speaking anything to have him stop staring. “The scar’s fading, slayer healing’s kicked in.”
“Right, jolly good. What about the other aspects of slaying, have you felt any particular urges which the coma may have repressed?”
And Faith knew what he was asking. Had she felt the fizz, the running of electric through her veins which signalled the start of a fight, the sensation that slid down her spine when a vamp was looking to be dusted. The feeling that her body craved every night when the sun went down, the feeling that her blood demanded as the moon came up. To slay.
“Urges?”
Never too frigid to talk about what the slaying did to her, how it had affected her. Never too fucking golden to admit that darkness mixed tight with desire. That every kill released a need to be alive, to free the energy, to release the tension. Eyes flicking, fingers tapping. Never scared to call it what it was, never scared to admit what it was she needed…
“Faith?”
Looking at her now. Being looked at. And Buffy knew, Faith was certain. She had always known. Eyebrows igniting that look called lust.
“Sure Giles. I got urges.” Blinking on the instant to crystallise it in her mind, letting the tiniest reminder of that feeling lace an expression of want around her lips. “A body knows what it needs. What it craves. A little close contact, some hard hitting one on one…”
“Right. Yes… I imagine after four years, that element of slayer power is rather overdue a workout. Perhaps Buffy, we could set up a training regime down here, obviously nothing like sparring…”
“You want Buffy to give me a workout?”
Had he missed the meaning? Were his collars really that starched? And did it really matter when Buffy had caught her meaning with such sweet perfection? Her eyes locked again, but not pinning her down… oh no, pulling her closer. The bars in easy reaching distance, her hands finding a grip that would’ve crushed metal if it wasn’t tainted by magic.
“You might find it helps to release some of the tension which you seem so determined to hold onto. I can only imagine how difficult this present situation is for you Faith; waking up to find everything changed, trying to come to terms with everything that…”
“You think star jumps are gonna resolve that?”
Because really? He was Giles, all wise and watchful… and he was suggesting some kind of Jane Fonda workout session?
“What do you think Buffy; is it practical to have Faith begin some kind of training routine, something to focus on other than…”
Losing the words again. Faith not caring again. Still wanting to know every word that was gonna fall wasted from Buffy’s lips. What grand back up plan she had in store for when the star jumps didn’t release the tension.
“I think Faith needs another shower.”
“Sounds good to me. You gonna wash my back this time?”
“I meant of the cold variety.”
Not wasted words. Precious words. Words which let Faith know that her interpretation of urges had been fully understood by Buffy. That she had set the flame that would start the fire. Watching Buffy now, there was still nothing dipping about her gaze - it was the opposite of dipping. Meeting Faith’s cocksure, smart ass stare with every ounce of maturity she had gained over four years of downtime. Buffy may not have appreciated this thing called desire, but she sure as hell wasn’t gonna be embarrassed by it anymore. Wasn’t gonna let it dictate the pace of the train wreck.
Something that no amount of downtime could have prepared Faith for. She had been so sure that she could trip Buffy with the same moves, the same meanings as she had always used; wasn’t prepared for the look that knew no mercy as it rooted her to the spot, as it made her fists wrap even tighter around the bars for reasons which had her taut emotions instantly more unsettled.
Flashes of different feelings. When the want, the take and the have were nothing to do with destruction. Just the simplicity of the action.
“Faith, is there anything else you wish to discuss?”
Not hearing. Still held. A thousand thoughts pinning her down, mind shattering as it tried to comprehend how this fit into her plan, how this fit into anything.
“Dreams.”
“Pardon me?”
A fragment, a wisp passing by on the breeze. Somewhere that Faith knew the hurt still resided. Would always reside. “I’ve been having these dreams.”
No cocksurety to her words, no hint of harshness to her tone. No footing that felt like level. Winging it. Straightening as she felt the advantage swing back her way, as Buffy’s eyes did show something other than composure, something other than a willingness to meet her head on.
“What kind of dreams; do you mean slayer dreams?”
“Dunno Giles. What’s a slayer dream?”
“Buffy sometimes has them, they’re prophetic in nature, a forewarning of bad things.” She watched him hesitate, his eyes almost excited as they considered the thought of something prophetic. “Perhaps you could enlighten me to their content?”
“Huh?”
“What happens in the dreams, Faith?”
“Right.” Knowing that. Knowing what happens. Focusing for the first time on how it felt in the beginning. “It starts off someplace real nice; got me a sweet deal with a double bed, clean sheets and maid service. Serious Giles, I’m thinking I’ve landed my ass in heaven, the place is so bitching. I’m kicking back, everything’s going great…”
A stare being met. Buffy‘s gaze wrapping tight around her own. Remembering. Putting her in place, making her vulnerable. Faith would strike first.
“…right until the part where it turns out it’s all bullshit. Ain’t nothing like salvation there, G-man, nothing but the same old crap. Hunting me down, chasing me through a fucking graveyard. All fire and brimstone, big lust for my blood…”
“Did you… the thing chasing you, did you happen to see what kind of creature it was?”
“Wasn’t no creature. Can’t you guess what it was? Come on Giles, I always figured you were shit hot with the explanations.” Glasses off. Eyes down. “It was Buffy, you moron. Your precious fucking Buffy. She tell you about that - how she chases me down every night to collect her pound of flesh, how she smiles all fucking sweet as she slides the knife in again and again…”
“I don’t think…”
“Fuck you with your thinking. You think I care a crap about training regimes and slayer urges? You think I wanna work anything out with your piece of shit golden girl, other than how to make her suffer half as much as I have..?”
“Shut up Faith.”
Fire and brimstone.
Edged in ice, carved from granite. Buffy had stood and listened to every word which had fallen from Faith’s mouth, and she had watched every shade of darkness cross her eyes as they had blackened. Urges at first. She had fought that battle and won it. Had choked for the last time on that level of submission. Buffy would not be controlled by a desire that had always left her at a disadvantage, would not allow Faith to gain the upper hand by way of default. She was stronger than that. She was older than that.
And this. This twisting of a dream which had been Buffy’s basis for diagnosis; Faith had shared her space in heaven and that had seemed more important than sharing Faith’s place in hell. Not so sure now though, not so sure that this sequence of events didn’t determine things a little better… that she should be playing the game from Faith’s angle. Seeing who landed on top. Wearing Willow’s words with a face full of resolve and strength.
Smiling a return to the snarl, turning her smile Giles’ way.
“Looks like this was a wasted trip, huh? And there was me arguing the non-psychotic point of view.”
“Fuck you, B.”
“No Faith. Fuck you.” Finally letting the slayer take the fore, finally showing Faith that if a game was there to be played, then Buffy was going to win it. She would bend over backwards to accommodate the chance for Faith to have a shot at getting her life back - but she would not break herself to accommodate anyone. “I’m done playing nice to placate the many personalities of Faith. Yes F, I stabbed you. Let’s remind ourselves how you went psycho and were killing for fun, hey? Let’s remind ourselves what *you* pushed me into doing…”
“Let me the fuck out!”
Seeing that contempt rise, feeling the urge to strike.
“No. You’re better off staying in there until you have all of your strength back. Cos when I eventually kick your ass for all of this crap; it’s *really* gonna hurt. Big hurt. Way big…”
“You are so fucking dead.”
“Wrong again Faith. I’ve been dead. Twice in fact- another thing you missed out on. This is me, alive and well, channelling the happy thoughts. You’re the one playing at dead, hiding behind something that is so stuck in the past.” Her footsteps had led her the same way as her bottled up rage. Inches from bars which she also wished were not there. Just one touch, something to smash one iota of sense into the rage machine in front of her. “It was four years ago Faith. Get over it.”
Breathing it into her space, feeling the return moisture of panted air falling across her lips. So much tension. So much which called for more than star jumps, which screamed for someone to remove the fucking barriers which kept them both caged.
“Buffy, perhaps we should leave this conversation for now…” The watcher not needing to see anymore, not needing further proof of Buffy’s igniting abilities. “…I’ll return to talk to Faith when the situation has calmed down.”
“Faith doesn’t do calm, that’s too easy.”
Eyeball to eyeball. Endless months of endless emotions venturing forward to replace the softly, softly approach that had generated only more harshness. Let Xander play nice. Buffy was through playing. Not wanting to move away, wanting to raise her fist and smash the space through the bars, wanting to wipe that look from the face that she wanted to see bathed in smiles.
She was so angry at Faith for refusing to be Faith. So angry with her for denying the existence of the person that Buffy so ached to see. The one she cared about. The one she had affection for. Just dark pits staring back at her. The psychotic look she had first seen in the dark and dingy motel room.
“Buffy?”
“I’m coming.”
Not turning her back and walking away, accepting the gauntlet. Eyes flashing with the thing that Faith wished for as she slowly put distance between them.
Holding hands and words of truth had done nothing to ease a path to recovery, and Buffy was becoming exhausted from the trying. Not only that;
Faith was *really* starting to piss her off.
The two heads that left the basement were both spiralling off in completely different directions. Giles hadn’t expected anything else from Faith, had known that the battle to bring her back towards sane, was going to be a long and hard fought one. He could take her anger and shouts of injustice, he could stand strong in the face of her pain. He had endless age and experience on his side. A lifetime of watching; his own forays into the darker side of good. Yes. Everything that Giles had seen, had assured him that Faith needed help, and that she needed help from someone other than Buffy.
Buffy herself was still feeling the electric flowing currents that ran through her veins, signalling the start of a fight. Expecting more from Faith. Tasting the disappointment. Fighting to shake off a vibe which would see many unfortunate demons perish in the dark streets of LA when the moon eventually rose.
It was the bastardisation of the dream that had Buffy relying on the physical to dictate the new pace of the impending disaster. A dream that Faith had denied when it suited her to, that she had then remembered and twisted to fit the situation when Buffy hadn’t fallen at the first hurdle.
Desire and lust. Something a slayer didn’t shy away from. Something a slayer thrived upon. Buffy had touched that truth, had tasted and revelled in it on those dark nights with Spike. And Faith would not trip her with that hurdle again.
There were no more hurdles. The spiral coming to a halt on the memory of Kennedy’s words. Letting her out.
Buffy had tried to offer forgiveness with friendship. The slayer didn’t know the meaning of such soft words. The slayer wanted to cut the deck and deal with the consequences. The slayer wanted action.
“Buffy..?”
Not hearing concern in words when her thoughts were still raging in the basement, still smashing a way through those bars to fulfil her desire for Faith.
“How do you think that went?”
“Huh?”
Pausing in the daylight of the lobby, catching eyes which tried to soften a feeling.
“With Faith.”
“Are you kidding me? It went the way it always goes. It’s kinda hopeless.”
“On the contrary Buffy, I’d say it was rather fruitful in its outcome. It’s about time you offered Faith some home truths…”
“Home truths? I was thinking more domestic violence; that could help, right?”
“I think it’s admirable that you’re still so concerned with helping her, after all she seems intent on putting you through; but the inability to call her on her past mistakes was becoming…”
“Boring.”
“No Buffy, more tiresome. Faith has to accept what she has done before you can ever hope to have her overcome that period from her past. Letting her forget the part she played was never going to have her looking to find forgiveness.”
“I just thought, I don’t know… I thought we could cut out some of the heartache.”
“And surely you appreciate that life is never that easy.”
Buffy appreciated everything about that. She had more than enough first hand knowledge to make endless complaints about the harshness of life. The harshness of living.
“So what do you suggest Giles, cos all I’m left with is a great big urge to go kill things. Big things. Possibly lots and lots of big things…”
Making him chuckle an amusement that she always looked to provoke in him. Making him glad that the solid stone eyes of a stone solid slayer, were being replaced by the soft eyes of Buffy. Pleased as she sighed the rage from her shoulders, pleased as her own mouth curved up into a smile.
“I suggest that slaying is a great idea. I also suggest that you heed my earlier suggestion about staying away from Faith. For a few days at least…” Ignoring the frown, using his wisdom. “…you provoke an anger in each other that isn’t going to help keep the situation calm. We’ve seen what Xander can do, we’ve seen that Faith *can* do calm and easy. Perhaps you should allow some space for Faith to digest these new…”
“What about the bathroom. What about making sure she’s fed…”
“You said yourself that everyone had ’scurried’ off and left you to deal. Now it’s our turn. I’m sure Kennedy and the girls will be on board, I’m sure that Willow will be eager to help now that the situation isn’t so dismissive of past events.”
“So this is it. You are taking my badge away again.” Her eyes weren’t incriminating him this time, still soft with feeling, turning towards acceptance, ready to receive the help that didn’t sound like instruction. “I’m sitting at the back of the bus.”
“No Buffy. You’re taking a few days break. You’re resting. You’re recuperating from another apocalypse. You’re accepting again that you have friends and we all work best when we work together.”
And where was this Giles last week, when she had been forced to leave her own home with her spirit torn and in tatters..? Buffy didn’t care. She cared only for the words which he had found now, filling the space that Spike had left to rebuild her armour. Offering a belief that they could work this out. That she was strong enough to deal.
“That was quite a rousing speech, Giles - have you been taking notes?”
“I thought you had been taking notes from me…”
Their words easy and light as they walked further away from the basement. As the last of their sounds dripped slowly down the stairs to fall into ears that were eager to hear.
The day had been a revelation for Faith.
She’d had fun times and smiles, she had bantered through breakfast. A glimpse of a past she didn’t like to examine, a glimpse of a future she couldn’t bring herself to imagine.
Easy. It had all felt too easy. And Faith had never had it easy.
The moments which had fired Faith’s soul, which had helped to reseal the fractures which ripped into her own flailing spirit; were the moments spent with Buffy. Close contact. Hard hitting one on one. Everything that she had felt the urges for. Everything that her body screamed it needed.
Howling screams. Painful screams. Close enough to breathe her breaths, close enough to feel the anger as it had pulsated harsh from her body. So tight. So close. Wrapping around every thought, blackening every need to find peace.
Faith had never been too frigid to put words to her feelings. Desire and lust, the thrill of the kill. She had always been too frigid, too rigid, to look for the softness behind the desire. To recognise the feeling behind the force.
A smile hardened her snarl as she heard them walk away with a lightness that her step had never been blessed with. Buffy could play soft, Buffy could hide behind the fucked up façade of good girls and niceness; but Faith had seen. And Faith knew.
Buffy was ready to give her everything she needed. Everything she wanted. All that she desired. Buffy was ready to get in the game.
Words which had filled Faith’s mind as the sun had set, that had placated her blood lust to hunt and to kill. To make a mockery of evil, to turn badness into dust.
Everything that Buffy was doing. Marching hell bent through the streets on a mission of destruction. Vampire? Dust. Demon? Dead. She wasn’t bantering out her frustrations, she was placating a blood lust of her own. Something that Faith had called out in her, something that Faith had always called out in her. The slayer.
Faster. Stronger. Bigger. Better. Loving the feel of the words as she sliced the scythe through badness after badness… as she showed Faith what was truly better about being them. About being chosen. No matter she couldn’t see, no matter she stayed caged beneath a building; this display was all for Faith.
Every monster slain a reminder to Buffy that *she* was not the monster. Willow’s words held sway. Faith had forced her hand. She hadn’t wanted to do it. Faith had made her do it.
More excuses for murder when it wasn’t Faith doing the murdering.
And Buffy couldn’t help the laugh that carried her aching arms through the doors to The Hyperion sometime close to the middle of the night. She really did want to get with the feel of superiority, really did want to step back and let Giles rein in the one that she had wanted to hold onto. She couldn’t dismiss the feelings though. Couldn’t stand scared behind words which had been earned through experience.
Desire and lust. A slayer thrived on them. She crafted them and made them tools in her artillery. Weapons to be wielded. A long hard slay inspired both, demanded both. A release of the feeling, an outlet for tension. Eyes which couldn’t help but fall onto the screen as it flickered light in the darkness. So tempted, so needing… go below, release the tension. Release Faith and ride the consequences.
Wanting to engage that fire again, wanting to stoke the still glowing embers.
As she approached the counter to retrieve the keys to the cage, her eyes caught the movement that the screen projected. The speakers projected the sound that the screen produced. Words.
And Buffy sat down. And Buffy watched and Buffy waited. Waiting to see who was with Faith, who had her speaking in calm tones against the backdrop of Buffy’s pent up feelings.
Nostrils flaring, pupils dilating. Urges rising.
Angel.
It took more than a moment for Buffy to comprehend what it was that she was seeing. Every other feeling that she had been seeking to repress, every other problem which had been ripping at the tattered frays of her unravelling mind; here. There. Before her on the screen. Doing nothing to relieve her tension, nothing to stop the electricity prickling at every inch of skin which covered every inch of straining muscle. Stretched taut and tight, tense with desire.
Angel.
And what the hell?
Had she not told him, had she not explicitly warned him about journeying back into her space? Had her eyes not shone dark enough, had he not felt the sharpness of her pointed words? Obviously not. Because if he had, then surely he wouldn't be downstairs now.
That tone of placation echoing with the turning of the volume knob, the slow steadiness of his words which sought to soothe even the deepest of cuts. Which caused the deepest of cuts. Offering comfort to Faith, when all he had done for Buffy, was to take her comfort away.
The warrior within wanted to rise up and strike out her vengeance. Wanted to inflict the same level of hurting that she was right now experiencing, wanted to destroy the chance of ever again suffering any further hurt. The warrior was strong and single minded. The warrior was still feeling the call of the bloodlust. The scythe residing with ease in her grasp, the breaths that flowed with deep determination from her lips.
And if everything about Buffy had been exposed in the personification of the warrior, then the morning would have welcomed a basement decorated in blood, lust and dust. But Buffy Summers was so much more than the sum of her parts, she was so much more than what destiny had determined her to be. She had control of a different kind; discipline and restraint. Years spent learning her craft, years spent learning the ways to silence the urging. The mantra that had always held her in good stead.
No.
That one word denial of everything that screamed inside for release, every dark desire that would creep unbidden to throw her from her path. Buffy Summers was not a small insignificant slice of the slayer though, the slayer was that small slice of Buffy. Some would argue the most important part; the part which held and wielded the power, the part which had saved the world on umpteen occasions. Those that knew her though, those that had crept close enough to learn of the woman inside; they would argue that the most important part was the part that wasn't hidden from the view of the outside world during the hours of daylight. The exact opposite.
None of her friends would have been surprised as she had sat down composed in front of the screen. None of them would have been taken aback by the ease with which she had pushed the scythe away from her body, across the desk, out of striking distance.
Buffy Summers was indeed one hell of a slayer. More importantly, in the words of a past observer; Buffy Summers was one hell of a woman.
As the time ticked by, it was hard for Buffy to steady her hands. At first counting off the minutes, and then - as the minutes had stretched into long past an hour- simply fussing at a hang nail which had been caused somewhere in amongst the slayage of the last two evenings. Just another war wound. Her ears not fussing on anything except the words that they had been hearing. So many words to hear.
The hurtful and hateful kind. The kind which could break a heart.
Buffy had believed that somewhere beneath all of the layers of Faith, existed the girl who had held her hands in freedom, who had met her smile with a smile as they danced carefree and unbound under the lights of the Bronze. The unrestrained force that had made her believe in so much more than just the solitude of duty.
Over the last three days her opinion had swung steadily back and forth - one minute believing that the girl still resided inside, and then in the next, wanting nothing more than to break down the barriers and destroy all that had sought to destroy the girl.
And now..?
Now she just wanted Angel to speed his long dead ass up the stairs and give her the answers that she demanded. Reaching forward to quiet the screen, ignoring the hangnail as something else had demanded the attention of the mind that wanted to fuss.
"Buffy."
Oh yes. Turning to meet and to greet. "Angel." Eyes emotionless. "What are you doing here?"
"Last I checked, this was still my building."
"Last I checked, I told you to stay out of my way. Which part of that do you need me to clarify?"
She silently repeated the resounding no, as her fingers itched to reach out and regain the scythe. Perfect for dusting vamps, perfect for performing her duty. Trying to focus on the reality behind the present situation; that Angel had always meant much more to her than just fragments of dust.
"I only came to see Faith."
"I got that. You're quite the conversationalist, aren't you?"
"You were listening?"
"Hard not to, I always was a sucker for the deep and meaningful. I think my favourite part was where you told her that her rage was justified… I mean, there was me trying to get her to quit the rage, then you come along and make it all A-OK to wanna carve me up into tiny little pieces. Kinda crazy, huh?"
"It wasn't like that…"
"Or maybe my favourite part was where you told her that she really doesn't belong in a cage - oh wait, no, that surely loses out to the soul soaring moment where you told her that you could help make her life better. Seriously Angel, were you always this full of crap?"
Buffy couldn't help but feel justified in the vilification of her former love. She had sat and she had listened to every uttering that he had offered to Faith; had sunk down in the chair as she had witnessed Faith rising, and she had seethed inside as she witnessed their connection.
"You don't understand what she's going through."
"Sure I do. Faith's woken up and realised that every bad thing she has ever done is still waiting here to haunt her. Now she wants an easy way out, she wants her payback… how am I doing?"
Angel offering no answer as Buffy stalked her way closer to his position. Rounding the counter, minimising the distance.
"She wants to play the fantasy where it's all my fault that her life is still severely of the lacking. What is it she said - she won't be happy until she sees me `flayed, splayed and kissing her ass in hell.' - Kinda touching, right?"
"She's angry."
"Join the club."
Because Buffy had anger. Just looking for a target, somewhere to find some release.
"You locked her in a cage Buffy, did you really expect that you'd get different results - that she wouldn't crave her revenge?"
"She was trying to smash my skull in! What did you want me to do; offer her cookies?"
It brought about a standoff, a moment when neither could find any other words to say - her eyes trying to understand why he hadn't taken her side, his eyes only wondering how to make it better. How to regain what he had lost.
"You know that she wants to come with me?"
"Of course she does Angel - you're head of Evil Incorporated - what wouldn't appeal to her?"
"It's not like that. She just wants a chance, the opportunity to start over…"
"She wants the easy option! She wants a room with a view and a Playstation 2! God, I can't believe this. Please tell me you didn't fall for her crap, that you didn't buy into her whole, redemption will be my mission, nonsense."
"She said that she wants to try - is that really so hard to believe?"
Yes. It really was. Because Buffy had seen. And Buffy knew. There was no way to dismiss the stares that had intruded upon her soul in those moments down below with Faith. No way for Buffy to believe that everything Faith desired was anything other than her own demise. The eyes that had always looked to seduce her with something that felt so dangerous and wrong. Every one of the words that she had just eavesdropped upon seeming dangerous and wrong.
"Faith doesn't want to try. She wants revenge. You're a fool if you think otherwise."
"Then I'm a fool, Buffy. I've been where Faith's been, I've walked the same path…"
"And just look at you now! Hardly a glowing reference, is it?" She couldn't care for the sadness that flashed through his eyes at her words. She meant every single one of them. "You may have chosen the path to all evil, Angel, but I'll be damned if you think I'm letting Faith go with you."
"It isn't your choice."
"And you think that it's yours?"
"No. It's Faith's choice, her decision. Whatever you choose to believe Buffy; we are doing good here, we're making a difference. We can help Faith, we can offer her what she needs."
"Oh really?" Her skin instantly prickling, the hairs on the back of her neck rising. Imagining the worst. Remembering the image. Him and her. Her and him. No matter that it had only been a ruse, a double crossing tactic - the unbearable ache had always remained the same. "And what exactly would that be?"
"Space. Distance. A chance to clear her head."
Okay. Maybe not what she was expecting. Confusing the thought process, missing the obvious. "Distance from what?"
"From you."
"From me? What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"You don't know?"
Skin prickling in a different way. Thoughts confused in a different way. "Don't mess with me Angel, I'm not in the mood to be messed with right now."
Grabbing for anger instead. Not prepared to examine his words in the cold light of a dawning day, to state the obvious in the starkness of the hotel lobby.
And if only he would cooperate.
"You can't pretend to me Buffy that you don't know what this is all about? Surely you've realised…"
"I told you already what this is about! She wants revenge and she wants payback. She wants me dead, she wants me buried, and she wants to dance a jig on top of my grave! Don't try twisting this, don't pretend I didn't hear all of her pretty little words…"
So close to the violence that her soul craved. Grabbing so tight to that anger. "…she's the one that's psycho! This has nothing to do with me!"
"It has everything to do with you."
Release.
Her fist flying as if of its own volition. Connecting hard and true. Denying the sound of the truth.
And sometimes it was so damn hard - being the one hell of a woman. Perhaps it was the hardest fight of all. The absolute control needed as she breathed in a breath to urge the anger away. As she looked down on Angel with a need to destroy everything that she knew he could seek to say.
Another breath taken. Another battle won.
"Sorry." Stepping down. Offering out a hand, pulling him back to his feet. "I forget my own strength sometimes."
"I might take longer to forget."
"Sorry." Anger replaced with exhaustion. With a slump to the shoulders that was accompanied by a soulful sigh. Not caring in the moment if Angel had set up shop with the devil himself. "I didn't mean to do that. I just… I…"
Just ready to break. Lost at sea and looking for a light; for her beacon in the dark. His arms offered easily, his shoulders still so perfect to rest her weight upon.
"Come on, it's okay. It didn't even hurt."
An unexpected break from the turmoil.
"You're just saying that."
"Maybe. But then you are drooling on my shoulder - I'll say anything to stem the flow."
"You sure know how to perk up a girl."
"You called me evil."
"I didn't call you evil, I called you head of Evil Incorporated - there is a difference, right?"
"I hope that you know that."
Ending the respite she had found in his arms. Pulling her head back, pulling herself back. "I hope it's the truth."
"You used to trust me Buffy. You can't trust me now?"
Recalling in a second every moment spent, every minute when she had felt assured that he was her champion. That he would always be at her side. "I want to Angel, I do - it's just hard. Everything about this seems so wrong, it doesn't make sense to me. They're evil - why would you work with them?"
"We're not working with them."
"Could have fooled me."
"We're not."
"You're not? So what? It's a double cross, a Trojan horse?"
"Keep your friends close, keep your enemies closer. What better way to bring down a beast, than from inside its own belly?"
And without anger tainting her view, it did make more sense than Angel turning evil and the whole of the LA crew selling out to the underworld. A lot more sense. And if only she had been prepared to listen sooner… to quiet her rage and give him the chance to explain.
If she had been asked in that moment, Buffy Summers would have probably ascertained that she could be one hell of an ass.
"Do you really think you can do it though? You don't think that they'll be expecting a betrayal? - that this is their way of keeping their own enemies closer?"
"Probably. But that's the fun part; outsmarting them. Taking them down when they least expect it. We know it won't be easy but we're willing to give it a shot. We're still the good guys Buffy, we're still fighting on your side."
She accepted the silence that he offered to digest the information; mapping out the floor with heavy pacing, re-finding that place where things were often painted in greys, where nothing was ever quite as easy as good versus evil. Maybe not believing that this was such a good plan, that they could make it work - but finding herself believing in his intentions. Finally producing a smile.
"Okay - I still think you're all crazy for going through with this; but I'm much less with the wanting to stake you now."
"There's a relief." She followed his direction as he pointed to the scythe laying easy on the counter. As he raised his eyebrow in memory of Caleb. "I remember what you can do with that thing when you're feeling frisky."
"Hey! I was never gonna use that on you!"
"Not even a little?"
And now the eyebrows raised to tease her into another smile.
"Maybe just a little. But I never would've, you know - between the legs." A smile that she kept as they made their way to sit down, as they approached the subject that was Angel's sole reason for being there. Faith. Gradually dampening down, gradually losing the sparkle. Knowing that he was waiting for her to speak the words - but still not knowing the words.
"What do you expect me to say, Angel?"
"I don't expect anything from you. I want you to say that you'll let her come with me - with us. She needs to get away from this Buffy - not just you - all of this. Everything that she remembers as bad."
"And that'll help? That'll make a difference?"
"I can't promise anything, but I believe so, yes. It's too much for her here; locked up by you, kept prisoner by you. There's going to be no chance for Faith to see past her anger when it's staring her straight in the face every day."
She wouldn't have had the energy left to argue with him even if she hadn't found renewed trust in what it was that he was saying. Only having the energy left to sigh out acceptance - to meet his eyes with a slight nod. To signal agreement.
"Where would you take her? When?"
"Tonight at sunset. We'll take her to my place. It's not perfect, but for now it will do. Wes can have the Shamen perform a binding spell, confine her to my quarters. We'll assess her from there, decide what happens next…"
"And she'll be safe?"
"Of course she'll be safe Buffy."
"Right. Of course she will." Wishing she could think of an objection, still feeling the need to not let go. To not give in. "What about visits? Will I be able to see her?"
"Do you really think that's a good idea?"
"Well it's not terrible. I can keep her up to date on what she's missing, remind her of the fun we used to have before she went crazy…"
She caught his look. Wanted to ignore it. "What? There was fun! Maybe hidden beneath a constant need to kill each other, but there was still fun…"
Trailing off as his look never changed.
"I know you want to help her Buffy - I do understand - but this time you can't help. These aren't your demons to slay."
"I can't do anything?"
"You can stay away. If you really want to help, if you really want Faith to have a chance, then stay away."
"But…"
But what?
Her throat aching with the need to give the truth a voice. To finally free the reasons that were never spoken out loud - to at last accept the one reality which kept her bound and tied to the bond of a chosen two. Only the words would not come. She was still not brave enough to lay herself bare in the starkness of a hotel lobby. The feelings were still enough to scare her.
"No buts Buffy, at least not for now."
Another sigh. Another nod.
One hell of a slayer. One hell of a woman. One hell of an ass.
As Buffy bid farewell to Angel and made her way up the stairs to the safety of her bedroom, the only thing that she felt like was one hell of a coward. Agreeing to let go of Faith - just like that. No word of protest, no hint of a fight.
And she hated being a coward. She refused.
Below Buffy, in the bowels of the building, there was another refusal being made. Another slayer inert with exhaustion, another mind wrapped up and held prisoner by the words of the last few hours. So many words. All words that she absolutely refused to have any belief in.
Why would she believe?
Her inbuilt fears only confounded as Angel had made his silent walk down the stairs to her cage; reeling back in fear as she had realised how vulnerable she was - a sitting duck. An immobile target.
"It's okay Faith, I'm not here to hurt you."
"Get the fuck away from me."
Forgetting the bars as he had stepped closer, hugging the walls with a desperate need to flee. To escape.
"I'm here to help."
It had been priceless. The angles of her prison remaining the same yet the angle for her escape changing within that second. She had still hugged her body close to the walls, had still kept up a charade of panic; but inside she had stilled. Had begun a slow count to infinity as his voice had launched itself into one of his soothing monologues.
Darkness, darkness, evil, evil. Rage, pain, death and destruction.
Very soothing.
Her smirk only growing as he had filled her in on what it was that was happening with her. As he had shared his great understanding of what she was forced to go through, to live with. Imitating the call of the darkness, dulcet tones deepened as he had dropped his voice to talk about demons.
And Faith's demons had howled. Had ridiculed heartily the half-breed stood before them. Taunting him with hated words about his precious Buffy - detailing with sick delight all the nasty little things that she wanted to do to his girl. So many nasty little things.
All met by silence.
The confidence slowly seeping away as he had forced her to fill all of the voids alone, as he had found an even better way to return her taunting. Just watching. Just waiting. Vampire eyes not needing to blink out an ofference of even a second where she wasn't confined by his gaze.
No nasty things left. Every sadistic twist spoken, every dark desire painted with the colourful words of her venom soaked vocabulary. And then silence. No comebacks. No slurs. No pointed fingers and accusations of guilt.
It had left nothing for Faith to rile against. Had left her only confused by the lack of rage, by the lack of screaming that was filling her head. Leaving it empty.
"I understand Faith. Let me help you?"
And then that. His words. And how could she believe?
No matter in that moment that her spirit had calmed, that she was experiencing a moment of almost peace - how could she believe?
This was Angel. Not her saviour, not her hero. Buffy's. And that was why she wouldn't believe, and that was when the silence had ended. Remembering angles, remembering the changing shape of her prison.
Faith had done the only thing she knew how. She had gotten back in the game. Had sucked it up, breathed it out. Back in the saddle and ready to roll.
"Can you get me out of here?"
Spoken like a pro.
Freedom finally in sight as he had nodded an affirmative, as he had settled closer to the bars and offered the hand of friendship. Forcing herself to listen to his words, forcing her eyes to mimic regret as he had walked her through all of the things which she had to repent for, that she had to face up to.
"Anything Angel… I just need to get out of here. I can't… fuck, you don't know what it's like having to see Buffy all the time. I try and get myself chilled out, get my fucking head straight - but all I see is her. All I fucking hear, is her."
She had even mimicked tear drenched eyes as she had whispered to him the deceit of her dream. Twisting the sequence so she could tell a tale of how Buffy had dragged her down into hell - pleading with him to help her find a way out. Something different.
Redemption.
Even now as she sat reviewing the outcome of the evening therapy session, she couldn't believe how soft a target he had been. How gullible he had seemed as she had spoken her need for salvation. It was adding more ticks to the unbelievable column. Those parts of her that wanted to believe in his words being forced down and conquered by the years of mistrust and enforced survival.
There was no fucking way he was on the level. No fucking way that this wasn't some new ploy by Buffy to have her on her knees and begging to play second string again.
No. Fucking. Way.
She refused to believe it. Easier instead to settle her mind with thoughts of escape. Planning her tastes of freedom as methodically as she wished to plan her taste of Buffy. Those nasty little things again. The taste of her fear, the taste of her pain.
Faith wanted to drown in it.
A smirk settling as daylight had started to dawn. Eyes closing. Her breaths steadying and deepening as sleep had consumed her as easily as all of her thoughts of Buffy. Dreams intruding. Peace beckoning.
Drowning in it.
The morning came as the morning always did; with confusion, with hurt, with pain and with suffering. Nothing softly, softly enough to break through the reality which still ripped at her side, nothing ever close to strong enough to break through the fear induced fog that ate at her mind. Sweat pooling, eyes drooling. Tears beaten back by the bitterness that called for her eyes to open. To look and to see, to remember the situation she was being forced to feel… locked in a cage, still trapped in her rage.
"Morning Faith."
Eyes closing again. Greeting the morning was always the least favourite part of any day. Not only since she had woken to find that her life had been held hostage by the pause button, but before that… since…
"I know you're awake."
And ignorance is bliss.
Only recognising the truth that to have *her* calling her forth to a brand new day, was the worst that it could be. Distorted dreams drawn out by the tone in her voice, dreams distorted as Faith tried to remember what was the truth and what was the lie. What was then and what was now. What was today.
She ignored the silence that made the basement uncomfortable and lay in a peace that allowed her to reconvene the madness. Remembering how to snarl, remembering how to scowl. Remembering that a smile could be so much more effective when it was Buffy she was trying to affect.
"What's this B, you come to kiss me goodbye?"
Exhausted from the process. Her shoulders steeling as she lifted herself up, as she turned to face the one that made her feel less with a mask that made her feel more. Made her feel in control.
"I want to talk."
"I want a pony… never did get it."
"It's time to cut through the crap, Faith. It's crazy, I know, but I really thought I'd be able to help you… I really wanted to help you." A sigh. Not sure who from. Eyes lifting, meeting green. Look away. Stay safe. "We need to talk."
Need.
Something that grabbed her attention. Something that could always make her laugh when it fell from Buffy's lips. Buffy didn't know need. She didn't know want. She knew nothing.
"Got nothing to say."
"You had plenty to say last night."
"Last night? Don't have a clue what you're talking `bout B."
"Angel?"
"Oh - right. Soul dude. My saviour. He give you the low down on the sitch… tell you how he's busting me out of the cage?"
"I didn't need the low down."
Faith disagreed. Buffy had always needed something low down. Something to knock the edge off the perfection. Not yet knowing why she hadn't needed it last night though, if Buffy had gained the gift of telepathy in the four years that had shot past in a blur of nothing.
She offered an expression which showed she didn't have a fucking clue what was being said. Her eyes directed to take the route to the ceiling. To look up towards a heaven when she had only kept her gaze trapped in the direction which led to hell. The camera mounted high up on the wall. The red light blinking out its eagerness to share secrets.
"I was watching you. I heard everything."
And that knocked her for a moment. Knocked her hard. A speeding rewind which tried to remember everything that had been said; which of her secrets may have been stolen.
"If I knew you were watching B, I would've put on a show. Never really took ya for the kinky type." Leering out a way to cover her confusion. Her arms reaching up, her chest jutting out. "You always play the peeping Tom?"
"I'm not playing. I'm through with games… with all of this. I heard everything you said to Angel, I heard everything that he said to you… now I just want to know why?"
"Why what?"
"Why me, Faith?"
It made her eyes flit back down, made her shoulders ache with the effort of staying disinterested. "Dunno what you're talking about."
"That makes two of us." Her feet creeping backwards as Buffy had sought to step forward. "I stayed up all night after Angel left - going over what you said, all the different ways that you want to see me hurting - and it got me thinking; what did I ever do to you that was so damn bad…"
"You gutted me."
"No - that's not it. The gutting - which I hasten to add was so not a gutting - came after the hate, Faith. I tried to pin it down… tried to remember exactly when it was that you decided to want me dead…"
"Moment I met you."
"Liar."
A killer and a liar?
"We were close. I remember that, so I know that you remember. And it keeps going back to that night in the alley…"
"Yeah? I spent lots of nights in alleys, ain't nothing special there B. Now seriously; this shit is really starting to irritate… can't you just fuck off or something? Find someone else to torture?"
Another step taken back. No way that eyes were gonna be meeting anything other than the comics on the floor. Bending down to retrieve the nearest… turning her back. Denying the sound that wouldn't stop coming.
"You know exactly which night Faith. And I keep going over it - what I could have done differently, what part of it was my fault - and do you know what I've finally figured out?"
Just looking at the pretty pictures.
"It wasn't my fault. I don't know how you've got it spun in your head, I don't know what it is that you think you remember… but I tried my best. All I wanted was to help you… all I wanted…"
"Bullshit."
And Buffy also knew when to take the silent option. When to stop taking those steps which had brought her closer and closer to the cage. When to drop her own eyes to shield herself from the hatred that had spun suddenly round to attack.
"All you ever fucking wanted was to be the golden girl! To be the number one chosen, top of the heap slayer… I saw that look in your eyes… scared my shit was gonna stain you… scared you'd be dragged down…"
"No."
"Fuck no! Fucking yes! I saw it B. You came to MY room, my fucking space, and you called me a killer. You don't like the consequences, well ain't that a pity?"
Space recovered. All of that old pain uncovered.
"All of this Faith, because I called you a name?"
Yet it felt like a lie. It tasted like a lie. Like a cover. Like more camouflage. No answer to a question which offered to reduce everything she was feeling to some pointless level of patheticness.
"You were like the tin man from Oz, refusing to feel. Not caring. Not even wanting to talk about it, to mention anything. All I wanted… I don't know… I didn't want any of this Faith. I never meant any of this."
Nothing but silence and stares and bitterness.
"I was scared."
She was scared?
"Faith?"
Scared. It was laughable. Buffy had been scared? She had been fucking terrified.
"Fine. Keep the silence. I can talk enough for both of us." Hands lifting to settle on the bars. So close. "I've had years to think through all of this, and believe me Faith, I've thought about it more than you'll ever know - possibly too much. But the thing that gets me, that single stick out moment that I just don't understand - if you hated me so much, if all you wanted was me dead… then why did you save me?"
Save her?
It had the subterfuge of the comic forgotten for the moment, had her eyes lifting to meet Buffy's whether she wanted them to or not. A confused look. A questioning look.
"At the docks Faith. Why not just leave me to die?"
Oh.
"Well?"
And did she know the answer to that?
"Because to me it doesn't make sense, it makes less than sense. I could have been dead, you could have been gone…"
"I guess I fucked up. I won't do it again."
That buzzing starting in the back of her brain, the buzz that reminded her of all the things she would never have, would never be. Like a rattlesnake sliding tight around her mind, squeezing out everything that argued the way to make sense, silencing anything that didn't ring out with words of familiarity. "Maybe I saved you, so I could kill you?"
"You really believe that?"
"It's what I fucking said isn't it? Jesus B, you think any of this shit even matters to me…? I made one stupid mistake and you treated me worse than a fucking leper… I knew how it was gonna go, I knew that first moment you came to my room how it was gonna go."
"I tried…"
"No, you never tried. I'll tell you what you did, what you do…" Her focus redirected as if the comics had never existed. Stalking back towards the bars, her eyes squinting shut to remember what it was she was seeing, who it was she was seeing. "…the only reason you were scared is cos you knew I was right. You were sailing close to that feeling B, I saw it in you… fuck, I felt it in you, and you couldn't deal with that. You had to make me bad, just so you could get back to being Miss Goody Fucking Two Shoes. You were so fucking smug B, so fucking glad that it was my mistake…"
It was washing over her like every other time she had paused on the memory; the self righteous bullshit, the virtue that just couldn't bear to be tainted. "…you caged it back then just like you've caged me now. It's what you do B. All your tidy boxes for all of your untidy feelings…"
"That's crap."
Buffy's voice coming to her hard and disaffected. Buffy's hands clenching tighter round the bars. So affected.
"No, you're crap. At least I fucking know what I am, what the fuck it is that I want!"
Contact.
Her hands reaching out to wrap so damn tight around Buffy's, grinding their palms against the bars, holding her hostage with the closest thing to the truth she had ever managed to say. Breathing ragged. Eyes electric.
"What do you want Faith..?"
Confusion. The allusion of skin beneath hers so close to all that she wanted. Holding tighter.
"What do you want?"
The illusion denied.
"I want you to fuck off. I want you to die."
Her words making Buffy's hands begin a struggle beneath her own. Urging on her madness, urging on the need to free the pain.
"Let go."
No release.
"What? Think you can send your fucking boy toy down here and soften me up with salvation..? You think I give a shit about salvation?! The only thing I want B, is you gone. The only thing I ever wanted was you…"
"Gone?"
"Fuck off!"
Those eyes truly tormenting her now that she'd found the strength to hold them. The green not reeling back in fear, the hands no longer struggling. Something different. Something more. A softness… a moment… more bullshit…
Hands torn away. Fingers clawing through her hair as if she could rip apart all of the thoughts. All of the things which crashed down on her from every single angle. Every whisper which taunted, every touch that…
"I know the game you're playing Faith. I know it's all crap…"
"You don't know anything."
"I know what I've seen. I know what I heard." She watched as Buffy's eyes again flitted up to the camera on the wall, understood the insinuation that none of her moments caged had been moments spent in privacy. "I saw you Faith. I saw you cry."
And she heard the words. The greatest blow that Buffy would ever deal. Greater than any knife to the gut, harsher than any jagged cut, deeper than anything which could be produced by something sharp and ornamental. This was fundamental. This was attacking a reality that Faith could not bear to have attacked, this was calling her on something which she would never stand to admit.
She was not weak. She did not cry.
"No you didn't."
Her voice softer. Her eyes darker. Memories of every tear that had fallen all of those years ago, imaginings of every tear that would have fallen in the intermission. "I don't do tears, B. I don't fucking cry."
Yet her voice sounded like all it wanted to do was cry. Like all it had ever wanted to do was cry.
"I saw you."
"You saw shit."
Stepping back. Further back. Shadows welcomed to hide the things that she feared she couldn't hide; not daring to show the truth. Not daring to feel the truth. Her truth resided in that place where tears were all wasted, in a life that had never gotten anywhere by feeling sorry for herself. Another excuse to be beaten down, another excuse to be made less. She didn't cry. She was not weak.
"Just fuck off B."
"Is that what you really want?"
Because somehow Buffy understood that this was it. This was the final throw of the dice, the final chance to make anything about this different. The final chance for her to hang onto Faith. To not be a coward.
Daring to step forward again, daring to let her eyes unmask every ounce of torn emotion. The confusion, the disillusion, the thousand things that she didn't understand. The things that had kept her returning to Faith when she wasn't even there. When all she'd had was a shell to hold onto, a memory to cling to. Not caring if her own eyes shone with tears, not caring if she wasted the notion on Faith. It felt like a last chance.
The last chance.
"Is this what you want?"
A gentle nudging. A gentle voice.
"Yes."
A gentle answer.
It was with trembling fingers that Willow reached out to turn off the small screen that had just sought to shatter the fragile peace of the early morning. The recognition harsh as she forced her brain to order the thoughts. The understanding harsher as she realised where it was that those thoughts were taking her.
Not frivolous thoughts - suspicions founded in an ever meandering mind - but solid thoughts. Rational thoughts. The kind of thoughts that appealed whole heartedly to the logical side of Willow.
The truth.
Played out before her in a black and white montage that could never mute the colourful array of emotions which filtered steadily through the speakers. First the violence. The thing that she had come to expect - the foul mouthed outbursts - the twisted face that seemed stuck in a scowl. But then…
Willow didn't quite know how to describe the then. The captivation that she had been held with as everything had seemed to quiet, as her breath was held through the accusation of tears, as her sigh was released on the gentleness of Buffy's words. The pleading in Buffy's voice. She did know how it had made her feel though, she did remember the sounds of a heart breaking. She understood everything that it meant.
And she despised the understanding.
For years Willow had found her comfort zone in dismissing the random moments of clarity that had urged her to take a closer look at the dynamics between the warring slayers. Her first kiss with a girl pushing her to acknowledge her first attraction to a girl. To consider the real source of her hostile feelings towards Faith. To recognise what it was that she had truly been jealous of.
And all of it dismissed as the overworked imagination of Willow- brain.
Chastising herself heavily for such silly thoughts. Reassuring herself heartily that any fleeting attraction to Buffy was grounded in a deep admiration for the woman who was her best friend. Reminding herself that Faith was evil - that it was never anything to do with… what? Love?
Absolutely not! No freaking beeping way mister!
Except that she had seen it. Had felt it. And even the steepest of her denials was being overcome by the tremors which still shook her body. Assuring herself she had cracked the code - deciphered the text.
Yet she didn't feel flush with the triumph; she felt decidedly sick.
Sliding herself into the shadows as Buffy had crossed the lobby before her, hiding the distaste which shone in her eyes as dark as any forbidden magic.
Willow simply could not bear the thought of Buffy and Faith.
It was something which hit far too close to home, uncovered way too many feelings that had been successfully smothered and doused by time. By a welcome coma.
So, so easy to feel seventeen again, to feel all of that same hurt and rejection again. It all clouded anything which urged Willow to hold back. Dismissing the intervening years of maturity and understanding. Darkening her eyes, darkening her intentions.
Finally directing her feet to take the stairs to the basement and welcome back Faith.
The desolate slayer was not expecting the sound of footsteps on the stairs again so soon after Buffy had left. She did not want to hear the sound of footsteps - of anything. The gentleness in Buffy's voice disarming all of the defences she had spent years crafting as protection - the look in Buffy's eyes doing everything to force forward questions that held more than enough power to topple the whole of her belief system.
"All I wanted was to help you…"
The softness of the skin beneath her hands as she had sought to hold Buffy a prisoner. The electricity that had sparked from the touch only enhancing the steady beat of Buffy, Buffy, Buffy which still infected her maddening mind. Only not so mad. Not in that moment.
And that was wrong. Faith was the affecter, not the affected. She was the player not the played. It was her turn to come out on top. It had to finally be her turn. So sick of being at the bottom. Belonging at the bottom.
It had made the soft skin burn. Had branded her in places that she did not ever wish to be branded. That one word mantra of destruction seeming so useless in comparison to the one word mantra of her…
"Is this what you want?"
God. So gentle.
Thump, thump, thump. Buffy, Buffy, Buffy.
Is that what she wanted?
Faith knew enough to know that every want of hers was drenched in the crimson stains of bloodshed. Knew enough to know that her soul was tainted in ways which could never stand up to gentleness. Could never bear to be encased in softness. Was it what she really wanted?
It was what she needed.
Anything to stop the thumping of her heart. Anything to stop the relentless chanting that had followed her footsteps so steadily down into hell.
No. The footsteps on the stairs had not been a welcome intrusion. The hollow words that had echoed against the dingy walls returning her thoughts quickly back to the present. The past. Another unwanted reunion.
"Hello Faith."
As hard as nails. As welcoming as an acid bath. Inviting the smirk to find a place on her face, twisting her lips to mimic with gusto the red head's obvious distaste.
"What do you want?"
"Aw - that's not very nice. Aren't you pleased to see me?"
Willow's tone of voice did not induce pleasure. Faith could remember so well the Willow of yesteryear; the pathetic excuse of a creature that she had sought to torment at every turn. She did not recognise the confidence. The power that radiated so menacingly in the former eyes of uncertainty.
"Guessing you're not here to play nice with the psycho Red, so how about we skip past the pleasantries and you tell me what the fuck you are doing here?"
"Oooh - someone's all touchy. Anyone would think you were feeling a little threatened Faith. Does it feel good?"
And she was the crazy one?
"Look, I dunno what your deal is - don't really care what your deal is - but I'm not in the mood for this shit. Either get to the point or…"
"Shut up."
Huh?
"You're right Faith, I'm not here for pleasantries; there's nothing pleasant about sharing space with you again. This is more of a… hmmm, what shall we call it? A 'friendly' warning?"
The question didn't ask for an answer. It only produced silence. No quick retort issuing itself from Faith's lips, no scathing comeback to wipe the smile from Willow's face.
"Everyone else may be rushing to find the friendship with you again - but I don't know - I guess I just don't trust you. You see Faith, Buffy's not the only one that's been keeping an eye on our new best friend. I've been observing the little lab rat too - and really? You're just the same as you used to be. Skanky on the outside… skankier on the inside…"
"Fuck you."
"No chance. I don't do skanks."
The seething hatred mirrored in both girls eyes. Willow peering with an intensity that left Faith feeling far too exposed. Naked. A rawness about her need to inflict violence, to control the situation with the only power she knew she possessed. Her hands again gripping tight to the bars, screaming inside with a need to break, to shatter…
"There's really no point in trying to get out. You could never break through the magic, Faith. I'm way stronger than you are."
Her hands burning with the effort.
"Just stay in the cage where you belong, and listen to what I have to say. Oh - you should probably try and pay attention to this part too, I'd hate to have to show you what I'm really capable of."
God was there hate. A different hate. The strongest hate. When Faith had found herself facing off against Buffy it had all been edged with an intensity that fed something deep in her soul - this was something which strangled her soul.
"What the fuck do you want?"
"That's pretty simple, even for you. I want you out of our lives, I want you gone. I don't ever wanna hear from you, see you… actually, I'd like to pretend that you never existed…"
"You think I wanna see you?"
Watching that smile trace the strawberry lips. The air seeming heavier with the glint that shone in the evil eyes of a jealous green.
"I guess not Faith, but that's the thing - I don't mean me."
"Huh?"
"Buffy."
That word again. The shaker of her beliefs.
"I don't want you near her. I want you out of this cage and gone from her life. And I mean for good this time. No death and destruction, no psychotic grabs at revenge - this is it. Game over…"
Words. Just words. A pointless stream of noise which prickled at her senses as it crept across the space to find her ears. Had she not already just covered this ground? Had she not just issued her own plea of `stay away', to the woman herself?
It made her eyebrows lose the scowl and settle instead in confusion - taking her own time to peer just a little bit closer - letting her own eyes seek out the truth behind the empty flow of words.
"Back up there, Red." Interrupting the endless stream to issue a few soundbites of her own. "For someone that thinks she knows what she's talking about, you sure spout a lot of pointless bullshit."
Finding a smile.
"You really think I wanna see Buffy? Are you completely fucking insane?"
Enjoying the silence that answered her question. "If you have been watching the show, then you know that ain't the case. I mean, sure - not gonna be upset if she dies a horrible death anytime soon - but I want away from her. I'm done with this shit, with all of you. I'll tell ya Red, my life's never been nothing to sing about, but it was a whole lot fucking better before I came to Sunnydale. Before I met your precious Buffy."
And damn, was there some truth to that statement. Even Faith could feel the honesty which had managed to sneak up on her words. Remembering a time when it had simply been about good over evil. About being right instead of wrong. And well, sure - there may have been a few shortcuts, ways to make the duty a whole lot more enjoyable, but the premise had always stayed the same; the good guys always won. She had been a superhero.
And then she had met Buffy. And then she had seen what a real superhero looked like. And she had known that could never be her. Could never be hers.
"I wish I'd never met her."
"You're lying."
"You what?"
"You really think I'd fall for that Faith? You really think I don't see what this is all about?"
"For fuck's sake!" Hands again finding hair in an absolute honest need to claw away the madness. Not the psycho kind. Just the normal kind. The kind encountered when it felt like you were uselessly screaming into a never ending abyss. Like no one ever listened to a fucking word you had to say. "I hate her, okay? I fucking hate her! Do you hear that, do you get that!?"
"More lies Faith?"
An absolute endless abyss.
"I probably should have seen it sooner, I mean, with hindsight it's glaringly obvious. You don't hate Buffy… you never hated Buffy. I get it now - what drove your little crazy train down the tracks marked psycho. I get how hard it must have been - knowing you'd never have her, knowing you would never be worthy of her. Seeing her with Angel all of the time; all those little touches that you wanted to give, all those loving glances that were never for you. I bet it itched at your soul Faith - getting closer but never close enough. Never good enough to be the one that she chose to lo-"
"Shut the fuck up!"
"Oh no. This needs to be said. You need to understand."
It was too messed up. So fucking far beyond crazy. Willow was attacking her with a wisdom that scared the living crap out of her. Terrified her. The words which she had silenced inside of herself a billion times over. Words which when spoken, left her gaping like an open wound. Prone to attack. Ready to break.
"You need to realise Faith, that if you ever come near her again, I will end you. Buffy doesn't want you - she will never want you. She hates you. We all hate you. Now do you get that?"
Did she get that? It was all she had ever got.
Her head dropping, her eyes closing. Ready to step back, to give in. Game over.
Never expecting the sound of the door swinging hard overhead. Enough interruption to silence her words before she'd had the chance to speak them. Forced to wonder instead if maybe she was wrong - maybe it wasn't all she ever got anymore. Maybe sometimes - just onetime - someone was on her side.
"Get away from her, Will."
His voice holding command in a way she had never heard before. No softness about a man face that still held the charm of a boy.
"Xander, I…"
"No…" His hand raising firm, his one good eye holding firmer. "…I mean it Will. Just get away from her. Leave her alone."
A light in the dark. A hero.
Xander Harris stood in silence as he surveyed the scene of the most recent destruction. He was used to destruction - had whittled away many hours piecing together the broken shards of his former happy home - but this he did not know. Did not understand. The weapons that Willow had used so effectively to batter and shatter Faith, seeming like words being spoken in a foreign language. So sharp, so twisted. So nothing that he had been expecting.
Xander had only flicked on the switch to the screen to check if his comic club cohort was still wrapped up in sleep. Not wanting to disturb her if she was still resting, yet as eager as anything to carry on the conversation of the night before. Friendly words. Something so much softer than what he had just witnessed from Willow:
"If you were in the X-men Faith, which X-man would you be?"
Remembering the snort of derision she had tossed his way, the smile which had become such an easy companion to all of her words. "I'd never be in the X-men - I'm way too badass. If I'm gonna be a superhero Xander, I wanna be someone cool…"
"Is this gonna be another ode to Batman?"
"What can I say? A girl's gotta have standards."
His smirk sneaking out. His posture bordering on comical. "I guess I'm the living proof of that."
"Nah, you're the exception. My moment of madness."
Everything becoming so easy. Learning how to banter past the bad, focusing on the fun times instead of the fraught. Something which felt like friendship growing in a place where Xander had never expected to find it. And he liked it. He enjoyed it.
There was a rawness in his own past that was still clenching tight to his chest and making his heart beat harsher - time with Faith had softened that. Had given him a purpose when his mind might've otherwise sought to wallow in Anya. In what was lost in the destruction of Sunnydale.
So much destruction. So much lost. His voice stating his wish that Faith not join the list of the dearly departed. His feet stepping closer to the bars to offer her the sentiment.
"Are you okay Faith?"
Honest sentiment.
"Totally great. Five by fucking five."
Only producing lies.
Only inducing a thousand question marks in his mind as he tried to think of words that might make anything better. That might douse the flames of hatred that had flared so fierce with Willow's words.
"You know that wasn't the truth. No one here hates you, no one…"
"Save it."
"Faith…"
"What? You want me to care and share and play pretty for the camera, is that the deal?" Her eyes still shining bright. Her shoulders still held rigid. "Not gonna happen Xander. I'm done being played by you guys. If I'm gonna get fucked, I'll get fucked on my own terms."
He thought of offering an apology. He vaguely considered asking what her terms might be - and he did the only thing that seemed right. That seemed as though it would make any difference to the glare that was threatening to nail him hard to the floor. Silence his only company as he made deft work of stretching up and ripping out a wire from the back of the camera. As he closed forever the evil eye of the witch upstairs.
"You really think that makes a difference?"
"I was hoping for a yes vote."
"Then you're a chump. It doesn't make a difference - nothing here makes the slightest fucking difference, does it?"
"What does that mean?"
"What do you think it means? Just look at me Xander! Jesus - you keep telling me things have changed, so what's changed? Why am I still the one getting fucked over? Why am I the one locked in a goddamned cage?!"
Because if she wasn't he'd be cowering in the corner like an overgrown schoolgirl?
It was the truth, but not the truth. Not the truth that Faith needed to hear. Not the truth that he would offer.
"I said that things had changed Faith, I didn't say that we were perfect now - that we don't make mistakes anymore. The cage was an impulse decision. You can be pretty fearsome for someone fresh out of a coma."
"What about the camera, was that an impulse decision too - did you all get your rocks off laughing at the dumb little prisoner?"
"I don't think you're dumb."
"I was dumb enough to believe that you were on the level, that you were my…"
A pause.
"Your friend?" Not missing the injury that flashed so plain in her eyes. The pain of betrayal. Pain he had placed there. "I'm your friend if you want me Faith, if you'll have me. Admittedly the eyesight's starting to fade, the patch maybe lowers my resale value; but I'm still a mean hand at fetching donuts. I whittle a good stake - I could come in useful."
Time stretching out as her gaze slid across him. Perhaps measuring, perhaps wondering. He wasn't sure. Only sure that he would stand strong, would stand and allow her to take whatever time it took to be sure that he spoke the truth.
"Told you I liked the patch."
Yes. She had. And it still made him smile. Maybe even more this time. Wishing that he could make her smile a return. Could wipe out the hours since she had laughed so easy last night.
"So that settles it then; we're buddies for life?"
"Whatever. Way my life's going, I wouldn't get too attached."
Not having a chance. Her monotone not inflected with anything that sounded like fun. Her eyes sticking to lifeless as she approached the front of her prison and confronted him without any of the energy left inside for anger.
"Why didn't you just tell me Xander - let me know I was putting on a show for the whole damn world to see?"
"I'm sorry Faith. I should've told you."
"Yeah. You really should've."
A sigh took. A helpless look.
"So what did you see?"
"See?"
"What was the highlight, what had the viewers chomping hardest on their popcorn?"
"It wasn't like that. We were only making sure that you were alright…"
"Great. Ever heard of asking?"
"In the future, I'll ask."
"In the future, it won't matter." He offered her a dipping brow, an honest show of confusion. "I'm out of here. Angel's bringing my release papers tonight - I'm blowing this joint."
"You're leaving?"
"Sure am."
It was news to him. He didn't even care that something approaching daylight had crept up on her face - he was still flashing confused. Not remembering that the minefield he was negotiating needed such a delicate step. "Does Buffy know?"
His foot inserted before his thoughts were formed.
"You wanna rephrase that?"
"Does anyone know?"
"Not that it matters, but yeah, people know. She knows. Probably getting the balloons and streamers ready right now - maybe even baking a cake…"
"Where are you gonna go?"
"Fuck knows. As far away from her as I fucking can."
Her? Here. Edged with the fiery again. That one special word all it took to fan the flames. All of Faith's hurts seeming to gather in the darkened depths of saturated eyes; old pain. New pain. Same pain. "I just need to get away from here. From all of this."
And maybe he could ask to go with her? Tempted by the harsh beat in his heart, by the tightness creeping across his chest; by the knowledge that this newfound friendship which had softened the blows was also getting ready to be lost.
"I don't want you to go."
"You what?"
"Really Faith; I don't want you to go. I get the bid for freedom, I understand needing an escape from all of the crazy stuff - but I like having you around."
"Yeah, bet it's a real laugh riot."
"It has its moments. I'll miss the moments."
Unexpected words painting her cheeks a new colour; a hint of a flush that was fresh to her face. Brushstrokes of confusion. Cover.
"You sure that preacher dude didn't pierce your brain when he went for the eye?"
Camouflage.
Xander saw it. Recognised it. And after what he had seen Willow inflict upon her just moments previous, he determined to allow her to keep it.
"Okay Faith - you got me. The sentiment is just a lame ass cover for the devastating loss of the comic club - I never actually got anyone to join my secret society before."
"You're kidding me?"
"Oh no, I'm being completely serious - there was this one time back in Freshman year when I thought it might take off. There were gonna be these little flyers, group meets…"
"I didn't mean the comic club, Einstein, I meant you - wanting to keep me here just so you can get me geeked up to your level. That's a pretty harsh punishment. Kinda makes me wanna rethink the whole friends thing."
Xander wasn't. He was cherishing it.
"I think you can manage the geek thing all alone Faith. As for the friends thing, that's a whole different ball game; you have to keep your end afloat or it all comes crashing down…"
"Told ya not to get too attached."
"Too late - I've lost too many friends lately - too much of everything. It'd mean a lot to hang onto you."
Her face flashing him a look draped in desperation and distress. So unsure of what was being said. His honest sentiment smashing through the camouflage to bring so many glimpses of the girl lost inside. "Hey, it won't be so bad, it's not like there's any ritual torture involved. I'll just drop by and see you now and then, maybe call once in a while…"
"You'd do that?"
"Sure I'd do that. I want to do that." Answering the voice that sounded the same as her face had looked. Making him ache, making him want to offer more. "Listen Faith, I know you don't like talking about this, and I know I swore on all things DC that I wouldn't push it… but if you really are leaving then you have to let me say something."
"I'm leaving."
"Then I'm saying something."
Breathing deep. Meeting the eyes. Stepping in closer - breathe deep again. "This whole psycho deal Faith, all of that going crazy stuff…"
"Wait Xander, don't…"
"No. I need to say this."
"No you don't. You don't need to say anything, right? Just keep it at the comics… we can shoot the shit on Slade Wilson some more. You know in this light, there's wicked hot resemblance…"
"Deathstroke lost his right eye Faith."
"I'm just saying."
"So was I." He wondered how many breaths he would have to take before she would seek to meet his gaze again. Counted thirteen. Was glad to stop. "I get that this is rough, but I'm not here to beat on you."
"You're not? You sure you don't wanna pick up where Red left off?"
And he started counting again. So close to losing her. Sensing the rising tide of anger that still festered below the surface. Hoping he wasn't pushing too far. Too soon. Almost as if he could see it as an entity creeping out across her skin; the way her body tensed, the way her hands reached up to claw endless through her hair. Fighting. Trying…
"It's okay Faith."
Wanting to break through the pointless bars himself and shake the sanity into her. Wanting so badly to understand what had taken the sanity out of her.
"Just go Xander…"
Watching her retreat. Not turning to leave.
He did have things to say. Things which had mulled in his mind the more time he had spent with her; the more time he tried to put reasoning to all of their actions. The good ones. The bad ones. Determined to speak the conclusions before he was forced to wish her goodbye.
"I can't go. As much as this hurts you to listen, you need to hear what I have to say…"
"For fuck's sake! Why can't any of you just leave me alone - all I want, is to be left the fuck alone!"
"Then I'll make you a deal Faith; you hear me out, and if you still want me gone - I'm gone."
Keeping a sense of joviality to his tone to combat the harshness of hers. Stifling a chuckle as she grabbed at the comics on the floor, as she twisted her body away from his gaze and buried her eyes deep in distractions to counter his words.
"Okay. I'm gonna take that as a yes."
A chuckle of something that would be joy. The way that she seemed to soften the world's blows. Even in this moment; balancing precariously on the fraying thread of newfound friendship - she still softened the blows. A woman, a slayer; yet still such a girl. Believing that the world could be silenced by the superheroes in a comic.
He envied her optimism. Focused his.
"As I was saying before I lost you to the lure of Batman; all of that crazy stuff Faith - the stuff back in Sunnydale - I want you to know that we're past that now. It's gone. Done and dusted. I'm never gonna beat on you about anything that happened - sure, I'm here if you ever want to talk about it, but I'm still gonna be here even if you don't. You're not the only one of my friends that has taken the dive to the wrong side of the tracks - it's a pretty crowded club, endless group meets… "
He saw her gaze sneak a glance. Knew that she was listening.
"…and the thing is; I forgive my friends. I don't torture them till they repent and get down on their knees to beg. It's a given."
Absolute attention.
"I'm a lucky enough guy to have seen the real Faith; here and four years ago. And I'm telling you now; that rage crazed guise you've got going just isn't you. Not the real you. It's not someone you have to be anymore…"
"You really think that?"
"I know that."
"Yeah…" The comic was tossed. "…cos it's all so fucking easy, right?" A sigh delivered. "You don't know Xander - you have no fucking clue what it's like in here… everything's so messed up, nothing makes a damn bit of sense to me…"
"That's life Faith. It's messed up and senseless and some days it'd be easier to roll up and die than to make it worth living - we still try though. You can still try."
He watched her flinch at each of his words as if they were weapons as harsh and as hateful as Willow's. Starting a pace, stomping out a rhythm. Giving him a beat to carry on his sermon. "Everything still seems rough, I get that, but things have changed. There's nothing left to hate Faith, no one left to fight against - just give it a chance. Give us a chance?"
Stomp. Stomp. Stomp. Over and over and over.
Her eyes different when she finally stopped. When Xander finally ceased counting his breaths at somewhere past hundreds and stilled himself to hear her verdict;
"Faith?"
An eternity of silence.
"Just go Xander, please… "
A hung jury.
Upstairs in the sunshine, away from the doom and gloom of the basement, a different kind of doom and gloom was settling down across the shoulders of Buffy. The number one golden girl feeling bottom of the heap. She had sought out and spoken to Giles after her time below with Faith; had nodded along with the pretence of agreement to each of the words which were founded in wisdom and maturity. And she wished that she could reject them all.
"This is probably for the best Buffy. I doubt that any of us here could have provided the kind of help that Faith so obviously needs… I'd have to say that with all things considered, this provides a rather satisfactory conclusion."
A satisfactory conclusion.
Nothing more than Giles' British way of calling it what it was. The End. An end that she did not want. Could not contemplate coping with. There were still too many secrets left untold for Buffy, still too many messes that she didn't want swept under the rug, too many words that were yet to be spoken out loud. In all of the time that Faith had been sleeping, Buffy had offered her a thousand different whispered words - millions and billions of jumbled up sentences that had never come close to touching the truth of the story.
Oh no. Buffy the Brave had never even spoken those words to herself. Four years she had sat poised with her mental eraser; ready to un- scribe in an instant any words which would pounce on her with the force of uninvited memories. Always so many of those. The wrong smell, the wrong sound, the wrong phrase; a million moments which could catch her unguarded.
The times when Buffy had held Faith's hand in hospital had always been the hardest to run from. A deadness in a connection that had always ebbed with life. The emptiness in her heart that had never been explained. Never been questioned.
And who needed questions when the answers were so unbelievable? Unachievable.
Buffy had always thought not her. Had clung to the reality where Faith's coma was an everlasting barrier to any kind of question that had sounded too tough. Too rough to deal with. Not banking on the sleeping, waking. Not banking on the insistent threat from her heart that it was ready to take up the beat again. Ready to name the tune.
Faith.
Such an easy little tune to remember. Buffy knew - it wasn't like she had managed to forget. The intensity in glares and stares. The electricity etched in just one touch. In every touch.
Name that tune.
Taunting. The words still too daunting to allow a safe passage. Like a game. Like rings round roses. Spirals formed to outrun the rhythm. Distraction sought to prevent falling down. Buffy could do it.
Like slaying!
In sunlight?
Or not.
Not really a distraction anyway when she considered how every blow landed inevitably reminded her of who she was trying to forget. Or not forget. She couldn't forget. Maybe not think about. And anyway, it wasn't like Giles hadn't given her plenty more things to think about. Asking her to lead again, asking her to give direction; to make decisions. A plan of action for the army of slayers that she had helped create. Because that was important. That was far more important than the dead beat that had taken up residence in her chest.
Than the deadbeat that was taking up residence in front of her eyes.
"Hey Buffy. Can I talk to you?"
The short answer or the long one?
"I'm kinda busy right now Kennedy, can't you speak to Giles instead?"
"You don't look busy."
"Don't be fooled by this total lack of action. I'm actually strategising - making plans - doing like all good leaders should…"
"Was it your plan to send Faith away?"
Kapow!!!!
Complete with comic book writing and exclamations aplenty. That's how it felt to Buffy at least. No place for hiding. Smashing headfirst into the solid brick wall that she'd been hopelessly seeking to avoid.
"You know that Faith's leaving?"
"Giles just told us - the girls aren't happy."
"I don't really see how it has anything to do with the girls."
"Yeah, well, you wouldn't, would you?"
The distinct aroma of a challenge wrapping itself around the words.
"Am I sensing a little hostility here Kennedy?"
The hint of distraction enticing Buffy to stand.
"Could be. Mostly though it's just disappointment - we were almost starting to think that you were human - that you gave a crap. I hate being wrong; it leaves a bitter taste."
"It does? I would've thought you'd get used to that after a while."
And it was all there: the sarcastic slice of perky in her tone, the hardness of the slant that cocked her hips. Every wrong thing that she used in her own defence against the weight of the world. "You should go and ask Giles for a mint, I'm sure he'd be happy to oblige."
"You really are something, you know that?"
"Tell it to someone who cares." Because Buffy really didn't. Or couldn't. Or wouldn't. "Now was there anything else, or can I get back to what I was doing?"
Almost turning to dismiss her. Ready to settle back down and remind her mind to think about something else.
So close.
"You didn't answer me yet Buffy - was it your idea to send her away?"
Forgetting perky. Feeling pissed.
"I thought we just covered the ground where this isn't your business - are you having trouble understanding - do you really need me to break it down for you?"
"You could try and break down the part where we're all supposed to stand back and smile, while you go ahead and get rid of Faith…"
And could she just scream? Please?
"I'm not getting rid of Faith!"
Except that `letting go' and `getting rid' both sounded the same in the harsh light of heartbreak. Both hurt the same. No shout loud enough to cover the empty echo of such empty words. Nothing hard enough to protect against the desolation that wracked her body in the moment that denial was sounded.
No answering words to fill that ever growing void.
And the silence was the worst. A space created for every unspoken thought that wanted to batter her already fraught defences. Memories thrusting fast. The present and the past. Every minute. Every moment. Everything Faith.
"You just wouldn't understand Kennedy."
Stepping down. Running scared.
"I thought you were gonna break it down for me?"
"Wish I could. Really don't think I can." Searching hard for the bouncy step, for the sun sparkling eyes. "Look, it's great that you're worried about her, we're all worried about her; but there's really nothing to worry about. She's just going to stay with Angel for a while. It's all for the best - a satisfactory conclusion."
"You sound like Giles."
"That's good… Giles is very wise."
"Giles is a jerk who doesn't have the first clue what it's like to be a slayer. To be like us. I can't believe you're doing this - what chance have any of us got if we can't even save one of our own?"
"Is that what you think?"
"It's what we all think! So Faith's past is a little shady - seems to me like all of you guys have got some shady in your past; it's hardly a good reason to cast her aside. To give up on her. She's still a slayer Buffy. She belongs here with us."
And maybe Kennedy was the wise one. The one who could force the issue. That could drag the words of truth from the fear infested Buffy. So scared of the realisation. Of the consequence of all the inaction. Every single memory reduced to a sigh as she offered just the faintest glimpse of what twisted inside.
"You really think I don't know that - you honestly believe that I don't know where Faith belongs?"
"Then why let it happen? You're supposed to be the big leader, right - so do some leading. Tell Giles to stick it."
"As highly tempting as that thought is, this wasn't Giles' call. Faith made the decision all by herself; it's her choice to go."
"Yeah, well if it was me you were keeping in a cage, I'd be pretty keen to up sticks too. Maybe if you let her out… if you told her you wanted her to stay…"
Laughter.
Fraught and frantic painful laughter.
Provoked by the absurdity of the statement; by the idea of standing before Faith and declaring the wish that she wouldn't leave. It was hysterical.
Hysterically sobering.
"Do you have any idea what would happen if I was ever crazy enough to ask Faith to stay - better yet, if I opened up the cage and then told her that I wanted her to stay?"
"Do you?"
"I can probably guess. There'd be beatings. Possible heinous acts with definite mortal consequences. There are certainly no happy scenarios. Believe me Kennedy, I've spent more than enough time thinking them through."
"Sounds bleak."
"It is bleak. That's the life of a slayer; destined for bleakness. You still glad you signed up?"
"I signed up after the inspirational speech, if you'd given us this one, I guess your ass would be sitting home alone in that dust pit named Sunnydale."
"I think I'm all out of inspiration."
"Well there must be something we can do, someway we can make Faith see that we're on her side. She hasn't even met any of us yet - maybe knowing that she's part of something bigger…"
If only. Not likely.
"Faith's not one for group bonding. She never really grasped the whole concept of playing well with others. I doubt that rounding up the girls to offer solidarity would swing much in our favour - except maybe a crossbow. She has real flair when it comes to being pissed off."
"So that's it - we're giving up, just like that?"
"No. We're accepting that what Faith wants is far away from here. It's not giving up, it's being mature. It's giving her what she needs."
"Right. So what makes you the big expert on Faith - how do you know what she needs?"
Kapow again. Memories prickling again. Conversation threatening to cross over into realms where she wasn't so happy straying. If Buffy took the time to listen, if she truly asked herself what it was that she believed Faith needed - where the heck would she start? Where the hell would she stop?
How would she ever keep her grip on the slipping defence of denial?
It was hard enough to deny the need that beat so strong in her own chest; she doubted that she was strong enough to ever deny what she had always seen in her reflection. What she had felt from Faith all of the times they had danced chest to chest beneath the strobing lights of The Bronze. When that taste of something so unrestrained had rocketed her heart full thrust towards disaster.
This wasn't affect, affectedness or affection. It wasn't desire and lust or the thrill from a kill.
Buffy knew exactly what Faith needed. Had always known. Beyond the cut and thrust, the hate and mistrust. The feminine wiles and deceptive smiles. Beyond blood stained alleyways and the hard ride to crazy. Buffy knew. It was in the eyes behind the door on Christmas Eve, in the fingers that brushed a photo in the empty office of a Deputy Mayor. It was in every single reason that Buffy had never been able to let go.
Name that tune.
So much being said without words.
Not turning from the intruding eyes of Kennedy - from the untainted mind that rushed fast to fill blanks. Flicking a switch - blipping a radar. "Oh my god."
Not even allowing a sigh to escape as every single dam sounded out a warning of impending flood. Broken defences. Flinching at the touch from Kennedy - from the hand that tried to offer a small stroke of comfort.
"Have you ever told her?"
The silence still saying so much.
Howling and growling said so much too. Screamed so much to one who wanted only silence. Little solder drops of sense burning through to confront the messengers of madness, little drips of destruction that wanted to signal an all-out war. Too much information.
And Faith wasn’t like that. Situations were only ever surmised by how best she could survive, what there was to be gained. Selfishly simple - Want. Take. Have. She didn’t ponder another’s feelings; she didn’t care if her benefits didn’t benefit them - life was what you made it, and she knew more than enough to know that in this life you looked out for number one. No other fucker was ever gonna do it.
So why the incessant screaming? Why the endless fucking choir that implored for her to shut the fuck up?!
The constant smashing and crashing of cymbals. The constant rise and fall of the words that did nothing to name her tune. She had never been religious. Never troubled by a greater meaning to a life that wasn’t exactly paradise; yet still her head was relentlessly pounding along to the heaven sent strains of Hark The Herald Angels… really so fucking ironic. The only thing she wanted to do to the heralding Angel was send a salvation sized splinter dead centre through his heart. Bust to dust the confusion that was doing a whole lot worse than any coma had ever done.
Four years of downtime sounded perfect right now. A forever of downtime sounded even better.
Nothing sounded worse than what was inside her head. Almost having her shaking, almost having her stopping the pacing to introduce cranium to brick. Sorely tempted. Sore all over.
Too much information.
“I’m here to help.”
“I was scared.”
“You can still try.”
Floating phrases which encircled her mind. Poking and prodding. Finding ways in.
“I understand Faith. Let me help you?”
“Is this what you want?”
“Give us a chance?”
So many fucking questions. Not a single answer.
No one had offered Faith peace as an option - no one had sidled up to her with a pointed weapon and induced her back to sleep. No one had followed the rules of engagement. The meaning of life.
This wasn’t how it worked. It wasn’t what she knew.
All except for Willow of course… now that had been a flavour that Faith was much more accustomed to tasting. The venom and the hate marching forth like sadistic little saviours of her soul. Something for the madness to hold onto. A dark comfort found in places that felt all too familiar.
“We all hate you.”
Never wanting it any other way.
Right?
Cue the chorus. Cue the itching beneath her skin as she fought her hardest to silence the encore, the crushing weight of a phrase that dripped with an antidote she did not desire.
“I never meant any of this.”
Not the script! Not the fucking way it was meant to play!
Unable to douse the burning behind her eyes as she saw again the gaze which had been wrapped in gentle. Wrapped in everything. Breaking everything. There was supposed to be pain and violence, hate induced agony - fights which swore that they would last to the death; not gentle. Not tinted pinks and dipping eyes and looks which only reminded her of lies.
Faith had seen looks like that before. Had learnt the hardest way what it was like to put her trust in them. To feel vulnerable. To need someone.
Holding so tight to the walls of resistance. Wanting to batten down every hatch in the hope of preserving what she knew. What was safe. Happy to stay forever in her tidy box if it meant that she would never have to face what lay outside. What lied inside.
Why she had been put inside that tidy little box in the first place.
Buffy had sought solace in the safety of her bedroom after the long hard talk outside with Kennedy. Slamming down the windows, turning the lock that sat on her door; trying so hard to hide from all of the things that she had just said. Not meant to say. Not then.
“Have you ever told her?”
Unable not to say them. Smashing through the silence to bring secrets to life. Harsh at first; a snort of disbelief, a sarcastic smile to wrap around words.
“Gee - during all of the mudslinging and duels to the death, I never quite found the time to let her know that she was important to me. My bad.”
Gradually losing the sarcastic as Kennedy had refused to let lying dogs sleep. Itching at the issue as rabidly as a mutt with fleas - “Maybe it is your bad. It’s hardly a big deal, is it; telling someone you care?”
“Oh look, proof positive you don’t have the slightest idea what you’re taking about. You may have all managed to cook up some fantasy in your heads about what Faith’s really like, but let me assure you: Faith doesn’t do caring. It’s this whole thing she has going for her - why care, when it’s so much easier not to.”
“Like you, you mean?”
And the smile had disappeared then too.
She would’ve liked to deny it. Would’ve liked to cling tight to her haughty airs and graces and assure Kennedy again that she didn’t have a damn clue what she was talking about. It was hard to be a bare faced liar though - hard to deny words that she herself had wrung from her own body just a few days previous in an offering to Spike.
She cut herself off. She spurned connection. A thing she had going for her.
Not because it was easier, but because that was how she’d had to survive. Get too close and you suffered loss. Care too much and chances were you’d be forced to send a sharpened sword straight through love’s unbeating heart. Or maybe slide a knife through its gut as easy as if it was butter. No. It was much better to survive than to face the consequences.
Only now, in the claustrophobic confines of her shut tight bedroom, Buffy did not feel as if she was surviving. The opposite. Each breath of air feeling rank and stale. Each tick of the clock seeming closer to sunset.
And she knew what she had to do.
Had reasoned with herself for hours. Back and forth over the unspoken words which had been spoken to Kennedy. Not exactly declarations; Buffy would never be one to trumpet out her feelings from rooftops on high - but words which had broken through the crap of her resistance. Speaking of forces, of power - of the way you could feel in an instant when everything around you sat exactly the way it should. In tune and synchronised. How just one look, one touch - god, one suggestive wink from one suggestive eye - was enough to spark currents strong enough to power the whole of the Western Seaboard. How one glimpse behind the mascara framed mask of seduction had been enough to melt away everything inside that had wished to stay hard.
And then - always then - how it had morphed into feelings which were tainted with hate.
“It must have been hard - in the end - to, you know… it must have been hard.”
“No Kennedy, it was surprisingly easy.”
…there were so many shouts of denial being sounded by then.
She had added the words silently until Kennedy had prodded even further for explanations. Her voice unable to cease the telling of the tale. How embittered they had all been. How sick with the betrayal. Even now Buffy could still remember fresh the rage that had flowed so thick through her veins - the absolute loathing for what Faith had become, the deepest desire to eradicate the feelings that she still harboured in her heart.
As easy as sliding through butter.
An unwanted memory that could creep up anytime. One absent mind. One quick hard smash back to reality.
“You did it… you killed me.”
It usually killed her perky spirit. Had killed it today. Not wanting to venture down again, not wanting to partake in the afternoon activities of forced joviality and nonsensical banter. Not wanting to make small talk about Faith and the impending nearness of her departure. No - the big talk with Kennedy had been enough to sustain her through the hours of solitude. Had led her to work out exactly what it was that she had to do.
And do pretty soon if the shadows across her bed were anything to go by.
The hour of sunset had always called to Buffy; since the moment she had been called as a slayer she had known inherently when the sun was bidding its nightly farewell. Not needing a clock. Not needing anything except the pumping of her pulse and the thumping in her heart. Barely perceptible. The slightest change. Tick, tick, tick. Pupils dilating just a fraction. A slight tightness of muscle. Ready for action.
Sliding back the lock on her door.
The lobby of the Hyperion sat deserted as the minute hand ticked its way towards sunset. Just dim light left to catch the dust dancing. Nobody about to witness the stealth of the slayer - sliding through shadows, creeping soft to the desk. Buffy had expected a crowd, had thought that she would have to use her greatest powers of persuasion to carry out the final act in the unsatisfactory conclusion. But no. The troops were disassembled and her pathway lay clear.
Great!
Or terrifying.
Her skin slightly clammy as she took the now familiar steps down into a now familiar basement. Holding just the tiniest bit tighter to the scythe in her grasp. Just an extra slice of courage, an affirmation of the feeling that she meant to set free.
“Faith?”
All commanding like. Not a trace of her uncertainty. Not a hint of an answer. Stepping forward. Her eyes sent skirting into the shadows of the prison in a bid to search out her quarry. Like hide and seek. Like more games. Except that games were supposed to be fun, and the figure that finally stepped away from the wall to meet Buffy’s stare was not bathed bright in the glows of fun and frolics. A stone set hardness in her eyes. A rasp of exhaustion from her mouth.
“Now what?”
“Technically? - now nothing. Angel will be here soon.”
Buffy could see the gaze flicking quick across the scythe, caught the momentary confusion as Faith’s eyebrows did the low down dip. The tiny twist of a snarl that curled up her lip.
“You finally found the balls to finish the job?”
“You could say that. In a way. Kind of.”
“About fucking time.” A snarl that dared to twist perversely into a smile - that dared to put some joy into her phrases. “Nice choice of weapon B - much bigger than last time. You gonna go for the guts again?”
“No Faith. I was thinking more the heart.”
Stunning the eyes. Confusing the eyebrows again. And Buffy knew why. She knew exactly what it was that her own eyes were showing - the things that Kennedy had called her on in seconds - the things that had always been kept guarded from Faith - “You do have a heart, right?”
Pouring out in seas of green. Not so scared anymore; not afraid of consequences when the situation already felt so much like death. Like loss. So sick to the pit of her stomach of loss. Staring out the sentiment across the secluded space which lay between them. And she wanted to venture forward - would have to venture forward at some point; but at this point her legs were not moving. Frozen by the face behind the mask. Aching from the need which sounded so desperate in Faith’s voice.
“Can’t you do this without the talking?”
And god.
Faith really believed that this could be an attempt at an execution? She wanted this to be an execution?
“Sorry Faith. I can’t do that. I’m never gonna finish that job…”
The crash of a fist against bars making her jump. One step back. Two steps back.
“Well fuck off then! Just FUCK OFF!!”
The crazed rage making her instantly reconsider her barely thought out plan. But where would that get her? Where would she ever get if she didn’t finally confront what had simmered inside for too many years?
Be brave. Be honest.
“I’m not going anywhere, Faith.”
Not even thinking about the risks of heinous acts and definite mortal consequences. Oh no. Buffy wouldn’t consider anything except her goal, would not focus upon anything except the task which lay at hand. The keys which lay in her hand…
“What the fuck are you doing?”
“What does it look like I’m doing?”
Selecting the right one to fit in the groove. Sliding it all the way in until it rested just right. Pausing.
“You said to me I keep all this locked up - that I’ve always kept it locked up - and you’re right Faith. God are you right…”
Twisting the key. The satisfactory clunk.
“…and now I’m setting it free. That’s what I’m supposed to do, right? Set it free?”
Buffy couldn’t prevent the second pause. Like dangling from the highest precipice and knowing that at any moment you were going to freefall into an eternal abyss. There had to be a pause. One final breath of sanity before she let it all out. Before she let Faith out. Not the only one trying to cling tight to denial…
“Don’t do that B… you don’t wanna be doing that…”
“Why not? You said that this is what I did wrong - I’m only undoing my wrongs. Setting things right. I’m sick of the tidy boxes, I’m sick of telling myself that you’re someone I’m supposed to hate. I don’t hate you.”
The words forcing Faith back, making her head shake and her fists clench. The air around Buffy coming alive with the sweet sensation of anticipation. Expectation. Feeling the electricity, tasting the danger.
The door flung wide. Stepping purposely inside.
“This is what you wanted Faith, so here I am. No more bars. Nothing left but me and you. So what do ya say? - are you still thirsting for revenge or are you ready to hear me out?”
So strange to be inside of the cage, to take a look at the room from Faith’s perspective. The dankness of the cell. The darkness in the shadows. The non surprise of the backhand that landed hard across her face. Just below her eye. Breaking skin. A scratch.
“Revenge it is then?”
“What the fuck are you doing B, what’s this supposed to prove?”
That snarl stalking her now in purposeful circles. Ignoring the openness of the door. Focused only in one place - “You think I won’t kill you?”
Focusing right back.
It was like Buffy had said; there was power in an instant where everything sat just as it should. In tune and synchronised. Her breaths finding Faith’s. Her stance settling down to match the challenge.
“I think you couldn’t if you tried.”
Smiling tight at the harsh laughter.
“Still so fucking superior. You know I can take you B… just been waiting on a chance.”
“Maybe you can. I’m not questioning the ability though Faith, I’m questioning the desire. You don’t want me dead. If you’d wanted me dead, we wouldn’t be here now. We both know that.”
A fist this time. Snapping her head back, twisting her neck.
“Stop kidding yourself. How much fucking clearer can it get…”
A foot nestled snug against her stomach. A rush of air from her lungs.
“…I hate you B.”
Her body backed slowly up against the wall. Letting the hand wrap slender around her neck. Words whispered up close, everything up close. “I could do it right now if I wanted… squeeze the life right out of you. Watch you die. Get you the fuck out of my head forever.” The ragged feel of bitten nails digging sharp against skin. “This is what I always wanted.”
Eyes digging sharper. Buffy could feel the cold wall making shivers against her back, could feel the breaths raking hot against her skin. Found the strength to speak.
“What about what I want Faith..?”
“Fuck what you want.”
Still so close. Her one word mantra.
“No.” Pushing back. Finding the fury for her own gaze. “Not fuck what I want - I’m sick of fucking what I want! You hurt me too Faith, I’ve got scars in places that still feel the pain - don’t I get to demand a little retribution? Surely I have to have a turn at smacking you around and pretending it’s all about revenge?”
She saw the light go out. Watched the arms drop and shoulders shrug. Witnessed again the eyes that begged for an execution.
“Yeah? You want it, go for it B. Take your best shot.”
The intensity from the touches gone in an instant. Just a sitting target. And Buffy looked. And she saw. And she knew. All of the reasons she could never let go. What Faith needed. Doing as she had promised. Aiming for the heart.
“My best shot? Okay. I don’t want you to leave.”
“What the fuck are you talking about? Get away from me.”
Taking her turn to do some stalking of her own. Letting her feet dictate the pace, letting Faith dictate the direction of their descent into yet another corner. Back into the darkness.
“No. You wanted my best shot; this is it. As crazy as it sounds, I want you to stay… I want us to put all of the bad stuff behind us, work through it - do whatever it is that you’re supposed to do with the bad stuff…” not resisting another step. An infringement of space. Letting the unmistakable energy draw her in closer. “…I want us to be back on the same team, fighting the same fight. God Faith, do you know how many times I visited you in hospital? Holding your hand while I moaned about the hardness of every day I fought alone, while I told you about all of the things that I never meant for you to miss…”
“Get away…”
Barely a whisper. A plea.
“I never told you though Faith, how I felt. I never told you why I was sitting there night after night, I never had the courage to tell you what it was that I always wanted.”
“Please B…”
Breaths shaky. So shaky.
“You always knew though, didn’t you? Always waiting for me to admit it, to accept it. I think you knew in the end how hard it would’ve been… maybe that’s why you pushed so much for me to hate you - you were just as scared as I was. Well I’m done denying, Faith. I’m done denying you. I care about you, I always cared about you. The first moment I felt you… that last moment, the look in your eyes…”
Her own eyes stinging.
“…what do I want? What have I always wanted?”
“No.”
“Yes. I want you Faith. Here, with me. I want you.”
And had her heart ever broken in two so succinctly? Staring into eyes that met hers without cover. Open and honest and terrified. And backing away. Fists balled to push at Buffy’s shoulders, mouth twisting to slide that one word mantra right back her way.
“No.” Hoarse and heavy, gaining volume. “No, no, no!”
“Faith…”
“Just shut the fuck up! Stop screwing with my head, god… I can’t do this! I can’t fucking do this!!”
“It’s okay…”
“I’m sorry, alright? I’m sorry for every fucked up thing I ever did; I wish it never happened, I wish none of it had ever happened! Just leave me alone… just leave me the fuck alone.”
She couldn’t - not if her life depended on it.
Buffy would back down though. She had never meant any of this. Every instinct urging that she to go to Faith, that she find a way to hold her close, to shoulder the sighs that kept rising from the open cage. Every warning begging for no. She had pushed to the breaking point. She had spoken out loud. There was nothing left to deny.
Settling back. The stairs offering no comfort. Cold against her bones as she watched the last of the day disappear. As her blood rushing fast let her know that Angel was here.
And she didn’t turn her head as he entered. Stayed stone still as he passed her by, as he violated the silent space of the basement.
“What happened?”
Surprise voiced at finding the door open and unlocked.
“Nothing happened. I was giving Faith an early taste of freedom. I guess she didn’t want it.”
“And this?”
He leant down and ran a cold finger across her cheek - making another shiver - showing her the blood that sat accusing on his hand. “What happened?”
“I walked into a door.”
“Buffy…”
“Just leave it Angel. Nothing happened. Everything’s fine.” Bending down. Retrieving the scythe. “I was just getting ready to go slay, thought I’d say goodbye first.”
Whatever. Smiling a greeting as Wesley made his own entrance into the basement, smirking at the way he seemed to creep his way down the stairs. Eyes darting. “Hello Buffy. Nice to see you looking so well.” Not noticing her split cheek, not noticing anything. “So where is she?”
“She, is here.”
And indeed she was.
No trace of a timid tone left in her voice. Nothing but the mask of indifference to greet her new found freedom. Her grand exit through the door to the cage.
“Wow Wes, someone sure decked you out with a big dose of the dark and rugged. Best looking watcher I ever saw.”
“I’m not a watcher anymore Faith, I work with Angel now.”
“You do?”
His nod. His vulnerability.
Buffy saw it in an instant. Watching Faith feed from it, watching her step closer with that leering smile of seduction fixed firmly back in place. “Guess we’ll be working pretty close together then. Maybe you can help me tackle those hard to reach places…”
“I think we can go now.”
Angel interrupting the moment.
And she wanted to laugh at the fire that flared so bright in Faith’s eyes. That instant where she could see so clearly the urge to strike. Understanding the feeling. This was it. She wanted to cry.
“Wait Angel… can I just get a minute…”
“I doubt that’s best Buffy. I’ll call you when we get her back to mine, she’ll be okay.”
No.
“I wasn’t asking. Give us a minute - we’ll both be fine.”
She watched him look at Wes. Watched him take even longer to look at Faith. Finally coming back to rest on her. “Two minutes. We’ll be waiting upstairs.”
Two minutes?
Two minutes of silence?
And what?
What was so mind-blowingly earth shattering that just by its bare whisper, Buffy could make everything okay between them?
She thought it through as she listened to Angel and Wesley take the stairs. The soft whoosh of air as the door closed behind them. The lacking of air as the basement closed in around her.
Not the one speaking out loud this time.
“I don’t wanna hear it. Whatever it is that you can possibly have left to say; I don’t want to hear it. I’m out of here… that’s it.”
Not moving though.
“Maybe you got some of that Sunnydale dust left in your eyes; I dunno. But this is all bullshit. Probably just a little of that guilt thing working against ya B - forget it - we’ll call it quits. You stay out of my way, I’ll stay the hell out of yours.”
“Did you not listen to a single thing I said?”
“Heard it all. Real nice it was too. The bit about hospital visits? Way touching. Kinda hard to confirm when the hospital’s buried in rubble though…”
“I brought you your clothes. Is that proof enough?”
“You did what?”
“Your clothes Faith. Your jacket, your boots. I had to buy new jeans, a top - the blood stains weren’t so easy to get out…”
“That was you?”
“Who’d you think it was?”
“I figured… I dunno… The Mayor, I guess. Wasn’t really thinking anything when I woke up. I just wanted to…”
Falling into silence. Tick. Tick. Tick.
And for a moment - just the briefest of seconds - Buffy thought that the breakthrough was coming. That the offering of clothes would be enough. That the proof that she had never left Faith would be enough to stop her leaving. Those brown eyes deeper than she had ever seen them… the air seeming to pause for the charge to gather…
And then not.
“I better get going. Angel’s waiting.”
“Right.”
Watching her back. A slow steady pace.
“Faith?”
A pause.
“I know you don’t wanna hear me, you don’t wanna listen to anything I have to say - but that doesn’t change things. I’m still gonna be here - I’m not going anywhere. I’m not giving up on you again.”
The shoulders lifting in a sigh, a hand lifting to run tight through the hair.
“Nothing but a waste of time, B.”
Walking away. Leaving.
A satisfactory conclusion.
Angel let his eyes linger on the form of the sleeping slayer for one long peaceful moment before he turned to leave. Tucking her in with a contemplative gaze, wishing her sweet dreams with one of his drawn out brooding sighs. Every night since her arrival he had done this, and every night he had wondered the same; could he really save someone that didn't seem to want saving?
He had worked with a refusal to believe it at first. For so many years he had observed the human spirit, had watched with awe and wonder the way that it always seemed to manage to triumph, no matter the depths to which it had plummeted - but not Faith. Sure - he saw glimpses, he caught moments where her eyes had softened and her mouth had smiled, but they were the exceptions. The milliseconds that were buried beneath the hours in a day. She refused a belief in humanity. She almost delighted in tearing it down.
"…yeah, well that's where you're wrong. There's no nasty thing that I could do that hasn't been done before. People are bad Angel, people are fucked up… that's life. Sink or swim."
The philosophy that he had drawn out of her through a constant barrage of conversation. "You think you're swimming, Faith?"
"What's it matter?"
Drowning.
And to her, he could see that it didn't matter. Or it didn't matter to her whether it mattered to him. He wasn't sure which. Wasn't sure if she really was past the needing to be saved, or if she was simply hiding her desire beneath layers more intricate than any that he had previously encountered. Protecting herself from the world which she claimed was only out to get her; had only ever been out to get her.
"…Different voice, same shit. You think I never heard this crap before - oh Faith, you're so very special, you know you could really be someone? - exact same thing my mom used to say before she'd get tanked and smack the crap out of me. Then there was good ol' Uncle Pete… he used to love to build me up before he sent me down…"
Eyebrows all a swagger, hips rotating a suggestiveness that he didn't need to hear. Pretty sure of the down that she meant she'd been sent to.
Angel had learnt over the last few days how much Faith could delight in the depravity of her past - almost wielding it as a new defence - her words able to twist and curse, her face able to find pleasure in the perverse. Something that had begun the more he insisted that they talk about Sunnydale.
Something which she really didn't want to talk about.
Those were the moments that made him think of the more - of the things that existed beneath the layers - of the things which she was trying so hard to protect herself from. The only word she hadn't mentioned, made only more ominous by its glaring absence. They had danced around it, had fleeted their feet in steps round the issue - but whereas before Faith had seemed adamant in her need to voice the name of the one that had ruined her life, now she seemed as if that one did not exist. The time when he had tried to force it, being the time that Faith allowed him to see how much her strength had improved, how close she was to complete physical recuperation.
"Buffy's been calling again. She wants to know if you're ready to talk…"
"I told you already…"
"You have to face up to it sometime Faith; the hurt that you caused, the people that…"
And she had flown from the sofa. Attacking him with such fury, with such pain, that for a moment he had been unable to protect himself. Inert beneath her, taking the punches.
"Shut up!" Smashing down into his face. "You think I need to hear what she has to say… you think I care about what she wants…"
He suspected that she cared a lot.
It had been another of those moments where the layers were ripped away, where the pain that she had been trying to inflict was only a reflection of the pain that shone so bright in her own eyes. The way that she had gasped to a halt - had rolled herself off of him, away from him.
"I don't want to talk about it."
Seeking refuge in the bed. Pretending at sleep that he knew she was feigning. Her face still twitching with the memories, his face still twitching with the truths that were revealed in her silences. In her punches.
And he knew that he hadn't been wrong before. Angel had lived far too many lifetimes not to recognise the catalyst behind the slayers deadly connection - why they had grabbed so thirstily for hate - the emotion that existed just beyond the thin line. Always a suspicion, always something that had shone in the green eyes of his girl when Faith was around. Something that still shone in her green eyes now.
He tossed out another sigh as the elevator doors opened up on his empty moonlit office, as he remembered every recent pained and strained conversation that he'd been forced to have with Buffy.
"…She hasn't mentioned me at all..? Eight days and not once? Not even a little - hey, tell Buffy I wish her dead. Or maybe a vague little list of all the really wicked cool places that she wants to hide my body parts…"
"She's in denial Buffy, she doesn't want to confront the thing that terrifies her. She won't let herself confront it."
"Great. So now I terrify her?"
"Not you, it's not that simple. What terrifies her is the way you make her feel - maybe the way you've always made her feel. It would certainly explain a lot."
She had pled ignorance for all of five seconds. Had stood before him and pulled her slayer face, had growled her slayer growl and gnashed her slayer teeth - and he had remained impassive before her. He had known that she would open up when asked; this was Buffy and he knew Buffy. He knew her heart.
When he had explained his theories, had explained a background story that she had always guessed at but never known; explained why it was that Faith needed to manifest her feelings as hatred in the extreme… then she had spoken the words that he asked for. Explained as best she could what she saw as the situation.
"You need to be straight with me Buffy, I need to know what it is that we're dealing with. Was there ever anything between you and Faith - is there still something between you and Faith?"
"Define, `something'."
"Buffy…"
"Okay - you asked. Yes. To both things. Don't ask me the what, why or how, because honestly?