POV Tara.
“So are you guys nearly finished then?”
It was about the tenth time she had asked in just as many minutes. Glancing up to the clock, back down to us, standing up to pace for a few steps, absently running her hands along the faces of the books. Staring back at the clock with deeply impassioned sighs. All stretches and yawns.
“You know if you stop asking, we’ll get done a lot sooner.”
“Well if you just got done already, then I could stop asking.”
And we weren’t taking our time on purpose. We have an assignment due in on Monday, and coming to the library tonight means that we can get all of the information we need to work on it over the weekend. It’s how we always do things. Meeting Buffy after her double shift at the Doublemeat Palace. It was routine, and at this time when the whole world feels a little wacky, it’s important to keep a routine. A semblance of something normal. Something to return to.
I had skimmed my eyes one last time over the rest of the text, made sure I had everything that we needed to do a good job, and then I had slammed it solidly to closed. Offered Faith the smile she had been waiting on. Obsessively waiting on.
“Okay, that’s me done. Willow?”
“Two more minutes sweetie…”
“Oh for fucks sake Red!”
It had sounded like a child’s whine, like we were depriving her of her favourite toy, her favourite plaything. It only made me smile at her more. Made me place my hand across the table and close Willow’s textbook. “Come on baby, if we want to meet Buffy we have to get going… we have all the notes we need.”
She’d looked about ready to protest, to argue the need to soak up one last drop of knowledge, one more unknown fact, but I had diverted her with my eyes. A slight raise of eyebrow, the smile that makes her go all mushy.
“Please?”
And then she was the one who was smiling, going off to return the books that she had just been so eagerly looking through, happy to take my hand into hers and set off together with Faith. To forget the scholarly pleasure and to lose herself in the pleasure of friendship. Conversation flowing between the three of us as if it had always flowed that way. At least as if it had always meant to flow that way.
“So I saw the toy you got for Dawn, it was cute…a little gross, but definitely cute.”
“She showed you it?”
I wouldn’t have said that she had started blushing, that she was giving any outward sign of feeling a little exposed, but there was just that sense of hidden vulnerability… it made her words sound guarded.
“Wasn’t she meant to?” I had watched her shrug her shoulders, offer a disaffected grunt. “She told us that you spoke to her…”
“It’s no big deal Tara.”
“Well I thought it was a big deal Faith, I thought it was ALL kinds of cute…”
I turned my gaze to Willow to witness the rolling of her eyes. The little impish grin that sat upon her lips. And yes, she WAS looking to tease her again. It amazed me how easy she found it to tease her now, when just a few weeks ago she would have assured us that teasing Faith meant probable death. That the girl was definitely psycho.
“Red, I don’t do cute…”
My overblown exasperated sigh had been enough to get her to stop. To make her look my way and await the reasons for the obvious dramatics.
“Oh just deal with it Faith, we know you’re all big and bad and tough, but you’re also all kinds of cute… embrace it, it’s a good thing.”
She didn’t look too convinced, maybe not so comfortable to be wearing the ‘cute’ label. But the soft toy WAS cute, and thoughtful. And most of all, it was nice. A good thing to do. Maybe a little nicer if you ignored some of the bloodstains and general grottyness… but either way, the thought was a good one.
“I wasn’t trying to be cute, I just wanted to…”
I filled up the blank that her un-ended sentence had left “To let her know that you care?”
And she didn’t shrug again that time, she nodded her acceptance of the truth.
“Yeah, I know she was pissed at me… cos of the B thing. I’d meant to give it to her weeks ago, I just forgot.”
I moved the step over to link my arm through hers. The three of us walking along together. Cocooned within our conversation.
“She told us that Faith, and she told us how not pissed she is…”
“Oh it was WAY more than not pissed! We got the full on Faith-festical. Complete with the odes… impressions… all out hero worship…”
It made me giggle a little, just softly, made me nudge Willow a bit more firmly in the side. Dawn wasn’t that bad. She was just excited. Tempted by the happiness.
“So she really doesn’t mind, cos I thought maybe she was just saying it… not wanting to upset me, to upset B.”
I paused in the walking, held firm to pause the two of them as well. I waited until she had turned to me, showed me those deep brown pools of emotion. Really such beautiful eyes. “Faith, she was no where near upset… this last week, just feeling the tiniest touch of happiness in the house..? She’s smiling again, like she used to smile… Buffy is smiling again…”
And she looked a little shy again, as if she didn’t want to take all of the credit. But I give credit where it is due, and it is so long overdue here. “It’s all true, whatever it is that made you come back… Dawn OR Buffy, it doesn’t matter. You’ve made them both better Faith. It’s all getting better.”
I started dragging them both back along before either of them could say more words. I didn’t want banter to cheapen the feeling. We all talk together behind Faith’s back, we have done since she has got here… and I know that we all feel the same. No hesitation to toast the idea of ‘Buffy and Faith’, because seeing it for real just makes so much darn sense. It’s in the way that their eyes shine at each other . The way their mouths smile for each other. We can all appreciate the good in it.
“Did Dawn tell you I’m thinking about staying? After all the ‘big bad’, shit?”
“Hey… she told us you WERE staying…” Willow looked at me a little confused, waiting on the confirmation of Dawn’s words. “…didn’t she baby?”
“Yes, she said you kinda… promised?”
“Right... yeah.” She undid her arm from mine and started with the tossing of her stake. Running it over and over, around and around in her grasp. “I did say that, the thing is I haven’t spoken to B yet, I don’t want to assume…”
I had stifled my laughter, Willow didn’t even try. “Oh come on, you are joking?!”
“What Red?”
“Buffy is full of the ideas of you staying in Sunnydale! Before you know it you’ll be picking out the fabrics together, dish towels… bed spreads…”
Faith’s eyes had widened with each new domestic shopping spree being suggested. And I knew just how she felt. The idea of happy families was foreign to me too, the trusting people to treat you right, to love you like you love them. I made a grab for her arm again, snuggled her back into the threesome.
“Don’t worry Faith, Buffy doesn’t do the whole picking out fabrics thing… everything will be fine. Trust me”
“You really think that she wants me to stay.., like forever stay?”
“I think she’d be offended if you wanted to go.” I smiled my softest at her. Offered her as much reassurance as I could with one look. And she smiled in return, her own soft smile before her eyes had left mine. Focusing into the distance as the Doublemeat Palace first became visible on the horizon. As the smell first started creeping up to greet us. I always wondered how Buffy coped, especially with the super sensitive senses.
“What’s the time?”
“Five to, we’re a little early.”
“Cool… it’s better than late.”
I nodded my agreement. Willow choosing to speak up.
“Yeah, so much for the pacing at the library, the, ‘oh, you don’t have time to copy the rest of the notes Wills, don’t worry about the dangers of academic failure’… nope, just gotta get there early…”
But she wasn’t listening. I was barely listening. My eyes trapped and held by the look that was flowing through hers. Not to me, not for me. But for Buffy. The littlest of our slayers choosing that moment to walk through the doors, to come across the car park to meet with us. Her own eyes shining. Both of them wearing the love.
“Hey B, you got off a little early…”
“Better than late!”
And you see? They even speak the same thoughts.
“So how was the library then guys, what did I miss… how’s things at home, is Dawn okay?”
“Whoa… slow down there Buffster! You been hitting the caffeine again?”
She hadn’t really spoken that fast, but she did maybe look a little wired, her eyes straining just a little red around the edges.
“Argh, long story… no sleep. Double shift at the Doublemeat, just give me something normal to think about…”
Our laughter rose a little, Faith moving in to walk at Buffy’s side. No longer a threesome but a foursome. Willow taking the time to fill her in on the happenings of the day. Nothing much. Just routine normalness. Probably a thing we should treasure; The monotony of a normal day.
“So why with the not sleeping, you still having the nightmares?”
“The slayer dreams aren’t the prettiest.”
The weariness of her tone was easy to hear, the obvious hours she spent tossing and turning, bearing the weight of the world upon her shoulders. She offered us a little smile, the tiniest of grins. “It’s not that I don’t appreciate the heads up, I do, really… but why can’t they actually tell me something that we can use? I don’t have the mind for the cryptic…”
“Pesky little powers that be!”
“You said it Wills.”
She brought her hand up to her hair and smoothed it back behind her ears, took another little rub at the bloodshot eyes. “It’s all part of the job though, I can cope.”
As her hand dropped down again she let it brush softly against Faith’s. Waited for the fingers to open up and enclose her own. Just a little turn of the head, a meeting of gazes. Those silent looks that say so much.
“I still don’t get why Faith isn’t having the dreams, it’s kinda weird…” Willow gave us all her best thinking face, turned towards the two slayers. “…you are still not getting them, right?”
“Yeah.”
And I know I wasn’t the only one that saw the slump to accompany the word. Buffy quick to jump in and refute any self doubt that was possibly brewing.
“Hey, it doesn’t mean anything. They’re probably keeping you all fresh for the battle, it wouldn’t do to have two exhausted slayers on the job.”
“It’s cool B. I know the deal. I fucked up big, the PTB don’t trust me yet to do it right.” She offered a shrug that begged to be indifferent, to shield us from the private woe. “It’s messed that you have to go through it alone, but I get it… you’re the slayer of choice, that’s the way it is. Probably the way it should be.”
I searched my mind for an argument to beat back hers, but I just didn’t know. Maybe the lack of slayer dreams IS admonishment by the higher beings. Maybe they don’t trust her yet to do the job for the good side… and they are so wrong! Surely it is as obvious to them, as it is to us, how good she is, how strong she is. That there really is a chosen ‘two’?
I expect I knew that it would be Buffy who understood it better, who knew how to make arguments of sense. “No way Faith, you don’t get off that easily!”
“Get off?”
“I spent years trying to ditch this ‘one girl in all the world’ crap, there is NO way I’m doing that again!” I watched her throw off the tiredness to turn her tone to impassioned. “We’re both slayers, the slayer… whatever, and the nightmares don’t change that. Nothing changes that, not anymore.”
“Uh…guys?”
We all turned our attention to Willow, to the vamp that was closing in with each passing second. “You think either of you slayers could maybe deal with that?”
But they were already moving, breaking the contact of the holding hands, sizing up the lumbering form of a newly emerged vampire.
“You want this one B?”
“You take it.”
I watched as Faith slid her head to the side, openly pondering. “You’re just saying that because of the dreams thing, right?”
“You what?”
“You think you have to defer the manual labour to me, get some of those ‘valued’ feelings racing through my body.”
I wanted to pay them attention, to follow the banter… but the vampire? He was coming closer still, across the park now, almost upon us.
“Err… Buffy? Faith..?”
Their gaze still locking into each other. Not hearing a word.
“I was ‘actually’ just feeling tired. Exhausted, generally beat.”
From the corner of my eye I could see her smile, completely ignoring the enclosing beast, completely ignoring everything except Faith. Bringing that hand up to her exposed skin, tracing it the length of her arm. “Besides Faith, I know it’s not ‘valued’ feelings that race through your body after a good slay…”
“GUYS!”
Wills screamed it, not me. The vamp was practically ready to take a bite from them, his form launching through the air to land upon them at any second. It wouldn’t matter then who was ‘the’ slayer. We’d be lucky to be left with one.
And then I watched Faith move as if in slow motion, maybe fast motion. Maybe I didn’t see anything at all. All I know is that I saw her smirk, I saw the wink… I saw the ‘look’ that she gave Buffy’s words. Then I saw her arm extended with a stake in her hand, and the vampire blowing on the breeze. I know my mouth hung open. I know that ‘that’ had been beyond fast.
“Nice moves slayer.”
“Glad ya like them B.”
Their focus hadn’t changed, as if we weren’t even there baring witness. The mating dance so easy to spot from a mile away, let alone as close as we were. Hands moving down over skin to find a way to hips, to bring bodies closer. Noses grazing with the slightest of intent. I had been entranced. Willow hadn’t. Her giggling hard not to miss, as her hand squeezed tight in mine.
“Hey Tara, you think we’re gonna get our own ‘dry hump’ demonstration?”
And of course I laughed. “Oh! I have my books, we can take notes!”
I mimicked getting my stuff from my bag as they both turned to take us in, satisfied smiles sitting plain on their faces. They didn’t break the contact of the hold though. There was still a chance we would get the demonstration.
“Do I even wanna know what you’re talking about?”
“Oh come on Buff, no playing innocence here girly!”
“Playing innocence?”
It was obvious the way that her fingers were still caressing Faith, that she wasn’t thinking anything innocent, far from it. She also hadn’t caught the meaning though, didn’t register the same understanding that Faith was shooting our way.
“Anya right?” We nodded our assent, offered our smirks and raised eyebrows. “Damn, I knew she was watching! Freaking demon pervert!”
“Watching? Watching what exactly… we were just sparring! SPARRING!”
And yes, Buffy had caught on too. I don’t know if she thought the volume would sway our belief, or if she hoped that it would hide her embarrassment. It certainly didn’t stop Willow in her quest.
“Sparring on the floor with…” She stopped and considered for a moment, recalling Anya’s words. “…‘Faith writhing around on top of you, and you full of the moaning’… ‘that’ kind of sparring Buff?”
“I pulled a muscle!”
“I betcha did, ya little vixen!”
It was just too funny, and also a little ridiculous. Two grown women getting busted for dry humping in the basement. In a way I suppose, it WAS innocent. More of the cute.
“Leave it B, we’re busted.” Faith turned to Willow and offered a smirk of her own. “At least now you know why training is such an important part of the routine…”
And yes, the eyebrows came out to play. I think they scare Willow a little, the blatant sexuality that she can turn on and off with the rise and fall of those two perfectly crafted brows. I watched my little red head as she considered Faith’s words, as her own were set to be offered. “You do train an awful lot, I suppose there has to be some benefit to it.”
I had to speak, had to remind them that I was still here. “So are we getting a demonstration then?”
“Well I’m game Tara, ask B.”
And the look on Buffy’s face brought laughter to us all. I’m not sure where the teasing ends and the truth begins sometimes. The boundaries always shifting, sometimes in the loop, sometimes out. It keeps it fresh, keeps it fun. Did nothing to stop the chill in the air as Spike made an unexpected appearance.
It wasn’t only me that felt it. I watched as they all stiffened, as Faith moved closer to Buffy’s side with that special sneer which finds her face whenever he is around. I let my hand find Willow’s, knowing that the tension gives her an acid tummy. A worrying frown.
“Evening ladies.”
Said so easily. So lightly.
I like to find the good in everyone, I truly do. I look for the good in everyone, but with Spike… I just don’t know. He has done some good things, especially last year. But now? Now it doesn’t seem as if I can even find the one thing redeeming. Praying for all of this to be over just so as we could say goodbye to him from our lives. Forever.
“What do you want?” Faith snarled it at him. Almost growling.
“Easy love, I just came to give some info to the slayer…”
And he had to know that he was baiting her. As if he had heard the conversation containing her doubts and looked to play upon them now. As if he sought to taunt her. It gave me my own worrying frown, a frown which didn’t disappear until I witnessed Buffy’s hand on Faith’s arm, the way that it moved up and down in confident calming strokes. The way her voice rose with strength and steel to dismiss him from our foursome.
“If you have info Spike, then you can give it to me or to Faith… we’re ‘both’ the slayer.”
His distaste was obvious, as was hers. What wasn’t so obvious though, was the reason that he had found to smile. The way he thought that he had the power to covet her so openly, to run his eyes upon her form as if he believed that they were lovers. But they had never been ‘lovers’, of that I couldn’t be more certain.
“Fine, like I bloody care, I’m just trying to help.”
“So help. What do you know?”
She hadn’t left Faith’s side. Hadn’t moved her hand from the arm of the person that she did love. Maybe finding her strength there, the ability to stand so firm in front of the thing which had haunted her for months. It was good to see, even as his words spoke of the rumours of a beast sent to get the witches, to get me and Willow, even through that, the strength in the slayers’ stances had made me find a smile. Find confidence.
We continued to walk as he talked, him on the periphery, gaining no entry into our tight knit group. His words bringing no banter, but instead business tones, for business talk. It was uncomfortable, of course it was, but it was more than that. It was a feeling, a taste in the mouth, a turning in the tummy. A feeling that sat and told me that something was wrong. Something was very wrong. My grasp was getting tighter and tighter in Willow’s, hers offering the same back, making me wonder if it was a general feeling, felt by the masses.
I Caught the vigilant swinging of eyes from both of our slayers and knew that it was the truth. In fact the only one who didn’t seem affected was Spike. And If only I had known why. But I hadn’t. All thoughts being lost in the scream as my girl was the first to see the size of the thing approaching us. The monster approaching us.
“Holy fucking crap…”
“And then some.”
The slayers had broken touch as soon as they had reacted to Willow’s scream. So quickly falling into fighting posture, Buffy’s defensive, Faith’s aggressive.
“Give me a plan, B?”
“Well… ‘don’t die’ is sounding pretty good again…”
It had sounded good to me too. Had me backing away as fast as I could, bringing Willow with me, restraining her from even thinking about getting involved. If it wanted us, then the best way for us to help, was to stop it from getting us. We made our way to the nearest tree, sought some kind of refuge behind it, peeking out to see the slayers embroiling themselves in a fight that even I wasn’t so sure of the odds on. Big and scary. That was all that I knew.
“Baby, we have to do something…”
“No.” I offered her my firmest look, there was no way that she would be using magic, not even thinking about using magic. “Not an option.”
“But Tara…”
“No!” It came out a little shouted, harsh. Made me struggle to soften my tone. “We have to get home, to get the others… it’s the best way to help.”
She looked back out, the fight happening just meters away from us. “But it’s so big… we can’t just leave them…”
Her speech was interrupted by the arrival of Faith, flying through the air and landing on her ass. Cursing the beast in all manner of ways. Her eyes were on fire, burning only more intensely when she saw us by her side.
“For fucks sake, you’re still here?”
“Faith we’re not leaving, there’s no way…”
“You don’t have the choice.” There wasn’t friendship or understanding in her words, they were spoken firm and direct. An order from the slayer. “Get home, and get the others… me and B will hold it off…” She started moving again to her partners side, all the seconds out of the fight causing her body to strain. “…and bring weapons… BIG fucking weapons!”
“See sweetie? Can we go now?”
She still looked resolute, determined to stay, to not leave her best friend’s side. “I don’t know, it doesn’t feel right…”
Her brow was scrunching as she thought it through, I was hoping that she hurried up. The beast getting closer to our position with every second. “…what if it’s a trap, what if we walk out of here and there’s a bigger badder beast just around the corner… then what?”
“Baby I get that you want to stay… really, but we can’t… look…”
I had pointed her back towards Buffy. The battle raging fierce, seeming as if all that the girls could do was to deflect the blows. Stay upright. Spike was there too… backing towards us as he… as he what? Led it our way?
No. Of course I didn’t think that. I only wish that I had thought that. Instead I had watched as he turned to us. As he spoke to the slayers. “The bloody witches are still there, they’re gonna get killed if they don’t piss off!”
Almost concern in his voice, mocking concern.
It was enough to have Faith’s eyes leave the fight as she sought us out again, her mouth set to open as she went to shout more instructions. Her body falling southwards as she caught the blow she wasn’t looking for.
“Faith!”
I watched as Buffy almost lost it too, her eyes only just fast enough to prevent herself from finding the same fate. Watched as the beast lumbered unencumbered towards our spot.
“We really have to go now…”
My own voice had found firm, was issuing orders. And finally she started to listen, started to back slowly away as her eyes fixed fully on the thing coming straight for her. Her gaze unwavering… it’s gaze unwavering. It was creepy, it was… it was like a connection.
“Willow..?”
Nothing.
“Baby..?”
But she didn’t turn, instead leaving it to Buffy to break the moment. To take advantage of the instant to crash her fist against the thing’s face. To make it howl it’s displeasure.
“Guys serious, please… get out of here…”
She had lost firm, had found pleading. Had turned her eyes to the thing she despised the most and almost begged for help. “Spike, get them home, make sure they get home…”
“Me, take the birds home? Are you off your rocker?”
“Spike…”
“No, I ain’t a sodding babysitting service…”
I didn’t want him coming home with us. I didn’t have the voice to argue. Faith taking the moment to bring herself back into the fight, slicing through the air, to land a kick to the back of it’s head, to make it turn and leave us for a moment. To let Buffy speak again.
“Spike… please?”
It made all of our gazes lock. Spike affecting the gallant pose as he turned slowly towards us. “Oh come on then, best get you home before bedtime.”
Did I notice the smirk? Did I still feel the feeling? Yes. And I ignored it. Let him usher us away with the sound of the fight behind us. Slipping further and further away behind us. Finally just the three of us left to our own thoughts, no idle chatter. Nothing being said until he chose to speak. Until it became apparent.
“It’s a shame I have to do this.”
We didn’t ask. We just looked. Not even sure he was talking to us.
“I always liked you two, out of all of them… less whiney, looking to see the good in a man…”
“What?”
He had stepped so quickly towards us that I hadn’t seen a thing. Had felt her ripped from my hands, had heard her scream. But it couldn’t… I couldn’t…
The image wouldn’t make sense. I saw him at her throat, I saw him drink from her… and it didn’t make sense. He had the chip… he couldn’t even do that…
It paralysed me, the shock, the misunderstanding. And goddess, I didn’t even try and stop him. Didn’t even move as he let her drop with a whimper and turned to me. As his eyes lit with the yellow feral glow and his voice spat forth with demonic excitement.
“I always wanted a taste of the red head… quite a sweetie you got there…”
I know I reacted then. I know my mind went to shoot forth and burn him with the anger his words had produced. But I couldn’t, couldn’t think faster than his fist reached my face. Faster than I felt the bone of my nose crack loudly beneath it.
Nothing faster than the blackness which had engulfed me. Which still engulfs me now.
I don’t know how long I have been here. How long I have been bound by binds my magic can’t break, been blindfolded by something I can’t move to remove. I haven’t spoken or been spoken to. Have just been waiting. All my thoughts focused on the memory of Willow falling, of the whimper that left her lips as she fell. My proof that she was okay. And how I know that I am not okay.
I freeze as I feel something touching my face. The warmth of human contact.
“Tara… I can’t tell you how pleased I am to see you.”
“Wh…who are you?”
My voice sounds so weak, I can’t help it. My stutter there to remind me of all of the times I had ever been weak. So easy to fall back on, the fear so easy to feel.
“Who am I?” His laugh isn’t calming. “Warren… just Warren.”
It rises manically further as he takes the blindfold from me. As he shows me the form of the thing that seeks to take so much from us. Just a boy. Just Warren.
“You… but you’re…”
“Yep! Crazy right?”
My head is nodding my agreement. All sorts of crazy. My eyes adjusting to the light, sweeping around the room. Taking in all the participants to the end of the world. And…
“Andrew..?”
And what? I don’t…
“Ah yes, Andrew.”
He makes his way slowly towards him, making me shiver as he runs his hand softly down over his cheek, almost caressing. It’s kinda… oogey. And confusing.
“What?… Is h…he a prisoner too?”
And I really don’t like the way that he keeps laughing. The obvious unhinged quality to his tone.
“A prisoner..?” I watch as he rips the binds from Andrew’s face, gives him back the power to speak. “Tell Tara how much of a prisoner you are Andrew?”
“I… I…”
“Spit it out, we don’t have all day!”
I watch as Warren wraps his hand tight around the boys hair, pulls firm to direct his focus back to me. “Tell Tara if you’re a prisoner.”
“I…” He screams a little as Warren tugs harder. “No! I’m not a prisoner…”
And I think I slump as much as he does. As I realise what this means. How we had let him into our home, our lives… and all the time he was betraying us. It hurts. It hurts worse than the nose. I really had seen the good in him, it didn’t seem right that he was here. That he was bad.
“Johnathan… release Andrew’s binds.”
I see as the someone else comes into focus. And now I’m even more thrown. Just another boy, maybe more of a boy than the other two… and how is this possible? How can they have done so much damage? They look… well, they just all look like young boyish nerds. Nothing dangerous.
“Yes master.”
I see the small one wave his hands over Andrew’s binds. Recognise the magic being used. The simplicity of the spell.
“Now Andrew, your task…”
And as he drops to the floor I see the woman behind him. Recognise her immediately as the demon from Buffy’s party… the wish demon. “Hallie..?”
She meets my eyes and I know whose side she is on. Steel shining through as she pulls her shoulders tight. The gag stops her from speaking, but I don’t need her words. I’m counting my troops, I have her on side.
“Oh you know Hal?” My words must have broken Warren’s focus, making him turn to me again, making him address me with that heartless tone. “She’s a very good friend of mine… you like the girls too right? Maybe you can have a go?”
I’m biting my lip to prevent my outburst. I can’t do anything now. It’s better to wait. I keep my eyes on him as he touches her skin, as he finds his way through the straggled material that barely covers any modesty. Keep her gaze as she seeks mine again. Offer her all that I can.
“Bloody hell! Can we not leave the bint alone for five flaming minutes..? We’ve still got the little deal of the slayers to work out.”
“Ah right… the slayers.”
He breaks his hold on Hallie, walks past Andrew’s prostrate form on the floor, and approaches the vampire. “Now what was the deal with the slayers again?”
Spike’s snarl speaks as much as I need to know, his words confirming my guesses. “I got you the witch, you get me the slayers…”
“Ah yes… and now I have my witch!… Johnathan, get the charm for Spikey here.”
“Master? The charm..?”
Those crazy eyes burn into him as he asks his bumbled question.
“The ‘charm’ Johnathan… the thing you conjured for Spike, to uh… get the slayers…”
The boy’s fear was obvious as he shook his head. He looks like he knows just about as much to do with the charm thing as I do. It makes Warren push past him, stride across the room and return with a blue velvet box. Opening it up to Spike’s greedy eyes and then placing it in his hands.
“You wear this Spike and the slayers won’t be able to touch you. You have my guarantee…”
I watch as Spike takes it out of the box. Know that my confusion is showing as he fixes it to his shirt. I don’t say anything though. Don’t mention that Xander has that exact same Star Trek replica pin sitting in his bedroom at home… that as far as I know there isn’t any charm involved.
“I look like a sodding poof!”
“You look great Spike, Buffy won’t know what’s hit her…”
“You’re right about that.”
He looks back at me as he turns to leave. Giving me a nod almost of goodbye, as if we are friends. It makes me want to vomit, to scream my disgust at him. But again I restrain myself. Focus instead on Warren. On what he is saying now.
“Sorry ‘bout that Johnathan, I forgot all about the deal…”
“It’s okay master, I deserved it.”
“Good job I remembered the pin! Stupid vampire.”
“But… won’t the slayers kill him?”
He laughs that laugh again. Pats the boy on the head. “That’s the plan Johnathan… he’s served his purpose, I don‘t need him anymore.”
He starts walking slowly back my way. Stopping to assess Andrew, to rise him up from the floor with the strength in his hands. “Come on, shake it off. Anyone would think you’d been hanging there for a week, oh… wait! You HAVE been hanging there for a week!”
And I’m still not finding his humour. Instead holding my breath in the hope that somehow he will forget me. Will stay focused on Andrew.
“Are you ready to prove your worth?”
“I… I am… master.”
No.
I can’t help but sigh. Forgetting to hold my breath as the final proof I needed that Andrew is bad is given to me.
“Excellent, it’s an easy job… I want you to go back in, but better than that… I want you to kill me the slayers!”
“No!”
I can’t stop my voice from demanding it. Making them turn to look at me. Warren with evil eyes, Andrew with empty ones.
“Yes Tara! We have something special for the slayers… a little vial with a little poison. All especially conjured for them by Johnathan. And all we need now is someone close enough to deliver it… someone very special!”
He sounds as if he expects applause. He gets none. I just close my eyes and pray that somehow everything will work out okay. I’m trying so hard to combat the fear. To hold in the shivers. To stay strong and focused. But my goddess… he is just so evil.
It’s of course obvious to me now that it is him who wants the portal to open, him who wants to use Willow to achieve his evil aims. And I really do pray as hard as I can.
“And don’t think about turning traitor Andrew, it really is too late for that.”
My attention goes back to them. Their words. To Warren’s steely gaze which is carrying as much threat as his tone. “If they don’t kill you, I will kill you… this is the only way now. Do as I say and I’ll let you live.”
“I’ll do it…” He stood as tall as I knew him to be. Wiping his arm across his face to remove the snivels and the snot. “…I can do it.”
I want to scream. To beg and to plead. Instead I keep my eyes on him. Make my last appeal a silent one. ‘Don’t do it’, over and over. No volume to get me heard. I watch as the vial is procured in his grasp, as he slides it into the waistband of his pants. As he turns and leaves without even one backwards glance towards me. And that scares me too. Knowing that he is fixed on the mission.
I hang my head with the weight of it all. Catch Hallie’s eyes again in solidarity. I don’t understand her secret smile. The confidence with which she can still hold her shoulders. If Andrew gets to the slayers, if Warren gets to Willow… all of this? Everything is over. I do smile back though, I may not understand, but I will offer whatever comfort I can.
“Well, well, well… just us and the girls Johnathan, what do you suggest we do?”
I swing my gaze to face him as the words drip into my ears. Show the horror of what I think he is suggesting.
“Master..?”
“Just kidding Johnny, we have lots of planning to do!”
And yes my sigh is huge. A huge big old sigh of relief. Which turns quickly into this huge big old sigh of sadness. I know what Warren wants from Willow, but more than that I know how much Willow has to give, the lengths that she thinks it is okay to go to, to keep me safe. A terrifying thought. I remember back to her promises, to her words reaffirming our love… and I just hope, and I pray, that she can be strong. I don’t want to be saved if it means losing Willow. I don’t want anything if it means losing Willow. I close my eyes and do my best to stretch my mind. Knowing my magic is useless but trying anyway. Just trying to warn them. All of them.
The big bad isn’t coming. The big bad is here.
Chapter 25
POV: Faith
I know that it’s fighting, I know that it’s hard… but damn it! It just feels so fucking great! Me at her side, her at mine… kick, punch, duck, swing… watch the thing coming in close again. A shared look, a signal… another punch, ducking the swing… and it’s ALL a fucking rush!
“B, we’re taking this thing down!”
An eye catch, a slight smile. Back to business. Doesn’t matter how long it takes, how long it has taken, cos this creature, this beast? I can see it slowly getting weaker, and I know that there is nothing weak about the way that me and my girl are working. Taking it in turns to take the heat. Her in, me out… keep on pushing it, keep on beating it. I watch as she lays another good one to it’s knee, hear the crack and whoop out my joy.
“I told ya girl, we’re taking it down!”
“You said ‘we’, that was my blow Faith!”
And I gotta give her the eye raise for that one.
“Team work B! Me AND you…”
I break off the banter to take my turn at the helm, swinging my leg high through the air to crash down against the head of the big bad beast thing. At least I think it’s a head. It has eyes in it… not so much of a looker though. Way past ugly. It screams as I connect… I scream as I connect, and still it’s just a joyous fucking occasion.
I stand myself down and watch as it staggers itself back to it’s feet, maybe sensing the finish that’s coming if it doesn’t manage to get up. It won’t stop the finish though, I know that it’s still coming. I send B the hand jive that means a double team, four fists better than two… prepare to give everything that I have got left to end an evening that started so well. My fists feeling each of the splits as they pound against the steely feel of alien skin.
“Faith, go left!”
And I don’t even think it. Left is my place. Moving in time to see her drop to the floor and sweep. Taking the weight from the thing’s knee that she’s already busted. Bringing it down again. Taking it out again. I watch her roll a distance away and I know that it’s my turn to offer more service.
“You think it’s time to finish up?”
I can hear the breathlessness in my voice as I speak, the evidence of how long it has taken us to get this thing under control. So much easier since our attention isn’t split between fighting and watching the witches, worrying about the witches. Easier to just let go when there isn’t anything else to worry about. It’s like sending evil a message… you don’t fuck with the slayers. It really isn’t worth it.
“I’m done if you are?”
And she has NO breathlessness! That same control that she always finds for her voice spreading out across the silence of an otherwise peaceful night.
“I’m done.”
The beast is back to it’s knees, whimpering in place as it tries to bring it’s hefty bulk somewhere close to standing. I think we both know that it isn’t happening. That I’m taking it out. I take aim with every piece of power that I have ever held in me, straight at the ugly fucker’s face, the steel in my boots crashing with maximum impact as I slide my foot true to it’s target. I know I scream again, or grunt, or howl… or something. It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that where there was a head, there’s now…
“B..?”
“What the heck..?”
And yeah. What the heck? Again the thing disappears and again I don’t get it. Don’t understand it.
“That did just happen right..?” I let my knees take the weight from my hands, resting just a little bent over… just a little breather, a little recoup. A little ‘what the fuck with the things that keep on disappearing?’. “Cos that’s three times now… and I’m pretty sure I never got that talent listed as a super power… but then…”
I stop as I sense her impending arrival, my eyes travelling up from the empty space on the floor to meet the sight of her feet. Her legs. Her body…
“Maybe you’ve got some hidden talents Faith?”
Her face. The way that she is smiling at me, her teeth clenching onto that tiny piece of lip, silent contemplation, her own eyes travelling up over all that I am. And I catch the sudden change in atmosphere. One crackling intensity exchanged for another. I feel it too.
“Did you wanna help me find them?”
I raise myself back to full height, crack out the tension that sits across my neck, wipe at the mess I’d incurred whilst fighting the disappearing demon thing. And it’s funny how close we stand without even touching, how the distance between us is nothing except that which we let it be. No air, no moonlight. Just anticipation.
I know that her lips are moving, I know that she is saying something. Her eyes are dancing with the kind of mischief I love to make… but I just can’t hear a sound. All that I can do is to look at her, study her. Just in this moment. Her hair a mess of fighting disarray, a scratch reaching from her ear down across her neck… and everything, all of it… I just can’t stop looking. I notice as she stops… as her lips quiet the sounds that I can’t even begin to hear, as her own eyes join me in taking the time to see everything. I let her gaze reach inside of me, let the moan slip from my throat as I finally feel her slip slide against me.
“I want you Faith.”
And I heard that. I felt that.
“You want me?” Just a whisper to soften this moment, to stop me from taking her with all of the urgency that I want to take her with. I reach out my fingers to trace the scratch which dares to mark her skin, moisten my tongue with the need to kiss it better. To lose myself in kissing her better.
“You know that I do.”
Her lips are moist too and now they’re pressing hard against mine. The warmth of her mouth surging heat through each of my limbs, urging me to not hold back, to not play coy anymore. The energy that buzzes around my senses is like nothing else, each of her kisses a signal that in her I have found my true equal. No longer a need to hold back… to hold anything back.
I reach for air in the same instant that she does, not breaking this kiss, but making it less. Giving time to turn my thoughts into words. “Do you want to come…”
And how do I phrase the next? How do I ask a girl back to my place and show her that I really mean it? How do I finally invite her that last step inside? I grab at all of the words that I have ever known, forget everything that could cling me back to a harsh reality, cos I know that it’s there. But if I just forget, if I just ignore it…
“We have to go to mine Faith, we have to check on the girls.”
And I’m duty slapped again.
I cover it with a telling nod, an agreement with the suggestion. “Of course B. Just what I was gonna say…”
The hiss that leaves my mouth as her fingers find the edge of my top, maybe belie my words a little. I don’t care. I focus only on her fingers as they sweep upwards across my skin, as they count the bones in my spine and dance closer together, until she holds me tight in her hands and speaks to me again.
“No you weren’t Faith, I know you weren’t.” Her tone is as teasing as the slight circles she finds for my flesh. “I know what you were going to say.”
“You do, do ya?”
“Uh-huh.”
Touches coursing back down again as she tickles her way to the top of my pants, edging inside to find the top of my panties. And can I cry? Can I weep with the want? Because I want it all so god damn much.
“Buffy..?”
“Hmmmm.” Her tongue trips out to taste her name upon my lips, her smile only growing ever bolder. “You were gonna invite me to yours…”
And what is she? A fucking mind reader now?
I know in my mind that I want her. That I need her. The same way I know that if her fingers dare to slide any lower, I won’t even have the dignity left to find a room, to find anything except the losing of my self in her. I lean back a little to break her game, to try and get a hold on what game it is that we are playing. I get the buzz, I feel the juiced from the fighting… but how juiced? How far is this going? I have to ask, I have to know.
“Would you have come B?”
It comes out a little like pleading, it feels a lot like begging, and it sounds just like a sigh as her hand slides down to find the naked crack of my ass. And I freeze, I don’t know what to do. Do I move closer? Do I urge her on with my words? Do I take a minute to breathe?
“I want to come Faith.” Said so husky, so weighted with a desire that I had only ever dreamt would be directed at me. Making me push just a little, just a transference of weight from back foot, to front foot. Her palm sitting flush against my ass as I move another inch closer.
My hands reach up to find the back of her head without even thinking, grasping with a firmness I would never imagine that I could find with anyone else. Wouldn’t even attempt with anyone else. Crashing her mouth to mine for just a second, just one outlet for the pressure which is building so damn fast and fluid inside of my panties, raging like a fire as her hand caresses harder against my skin. And it’s B that breaks it back now. Her that shows me breathlessness.
“Faith.”
Can I taste my name on her lips too? My own slip of tongue.
“Wait… stop…”
“Mmmm…” I can’t stop. Don’t want to stop. Will not stop…
“OW!”
And she pinched me! She damn well just pinched my bare ass!
“Fuck B!”
And she’s laughing?
“Sorry, I just…” Her face is showing something mocking contrite. Eyes gleaming in a way that still speaks of mischief. I don’t know what to do. Do I break her hand from it’s place and lose the feel of her fingers, or do I just grin my way through the torment of the pinch?
“You didn’t have to be so hard…”
I let her now soft soothing strokes calm me… wait. I let the soothing strokes distract me. There is nothing calm about me.
“Well you wouldn’t stop, and I wanted to ask you something.”
And I can’t stop myself from leaning in again as her hands slide the length of my ass, pressed tightly inside of my pants. Not close to home, but close enough to make me feel it. Fighting hard to stop myself finding a tighter position, from forcing her to feel it too. To feel me… fill me.
Words. Words will help. “What did you… uh…” I can’t help the sigh, the little intake of breath. “… what did you wanna ask me?”
Her hands slide out from their lazy ministrations to find their way again across the skin of my back. Nestling me in close and speaking quietly into my shoulder.
“Tonight, after we check the witches… see to Dawn, check in with Giles… after all of that stuff?”
“Yeah?”
“Will you stay with me Faith?”
“You want me to stay?”
She brings her face away from my jacket to look me in the eye, and this smile that I have is all for her. Everything I have is all for her.
“I want it more than anything.”
Can eyes shine without tears? Can they sparkle just from happiness? Because her eyes are sparkling and shining, and I want nothing more than to keep them that way. I let my lips give her my ‘yes’, in kisses which aren’t demanding, I haven’t anything left to demand from her. This is all that I want too.
I seek to confirm it to her with my words. “I would love to stay.”
“Well that’s a relief!”
I push back as her giggles reach my ears. As her body quivers just that tiny bit against mine. “Are you okay there B?”
“Uh-huh… just, well… I had these visions.”
“No shit? Like Cordy?”
And now I’m giggling too, and fuck knows why!
“No ya silly dope”
I’m a dope now?
“You what?”
“I had these visions of you saying ‘no’…”
Yeah. I am so NOT the dope here.
“…I thought I might have to use force. I was gonna have rope, there was a full list of restraints, diagrams…”
Do I let her just carry on?
“…possible chains, something to combat the slayer strength…”
“I’m staying okay? There’s no bondage necessary.”
I lift my finger to her lips to quiet her words. Let the sweetness of her nervousness touch somewhere deep inside of me. It’s that innocence again, the thing that I had thought that neither of us could still posses. An innocence mocked by her tongue as it slides from her mouth to flick at my finger, mocked by her eyes as she shows me that we are big girls now. That there’s an end to all of our games.
“Not even a little bit of bondage Faith?”
Or maybe there’s a start to our games?
I pull my finger from the sudden vice grip of her teeth as she seduces me again within the instant. I could banter, I could play it hard, infact there’s a thousand different ways in which I could answer her. But I settle for no games. Settle for knowing that the look in her eyes signals exactly the same.
“Just take me home B.”
She brings her hands down to find mine, a touch that I had grown so used to over the last of these days, a touch that I didn’t want to let go of. A gentle tugging to point me in the right direction.
“So I guess we should get going then?”
“Ain’t no guessing involved.”
And we walked. And we talked. And none of it was anything to do with any of the things that make the night time go bump. Sure they were there, resting on the periphery of our gazes, eyes always flicking to keep up that constant guard, but they weren’t touching us. We talked instead about the kind of things which bring you closer together without you even realising it, things which can only ever matter if that other person gives a shit. Nothing to everyone except to that someone special. I learnt how many washes it takes to get the smell of the Double Meat out of her hair. The futility of the hours she had spent trying to find a job and ending up with this something that she hates with a passion. She told me how she wanted nothing more than to go back to college, how death had stolen that time from her too.
And what did I have to say? I had words which brought us back around to the things which we had continued to leave unmentioned, all because it wasn’t time to save ourselves yet. Or some other crap. It wasn’t like I meant to, I was just being honest with her. She asked me about my training with Angel, and I told it like it was.
“Yeah, he’s cool to work with, he’s got that centred thing going on…”
“I remember the centred.”
“Right.” Of course she did. It didn’t upset me. I loved him too. Different but the same. “Well that’s kinda it, we work on my calm, and we work on my speed.”
“I noticed that… not the calm, although I get the calm, but the speed…” Her eyes had a curious quality and I knew that I would speak the truth when she asked. “…you put me on my backside easy enough, and with the beasts…”
“You wanna know why right?”
I felt the quick flash of pain, a flash of a memory registering for me, and I knew that it must be registering for her too. I could see it in her eyes. It’s all about the hurt sometimes, and these were times which had more than hurt. I took her silent sombre nod as my road to continue.
“After I got out I went to Angel, and well… I guess I was pretty much screwed. I knew how bad I had fucked everything B. I knew I wasn’t looking to ever get a chance to make that right…” I blew the sigh from my lips out into the night. “…I just wanted to make sure that I never fucked up like that again.”
“So you made yourself faster.”
“It’s all that I could think of. I relived that night so many times, you know? That instant, that second, your voice… my stake. I swear, I’ve seen it over and over again… my mistake, my fuck up.”
I didn’t want it to still hurt the same, but speaking it out loud, and speaking it to her..? It had every block I had carefully crafted crumbling right before her. Not wiping at the feeling in my eyes, because it was so right to show it to her, letting her see what it did to me. I had lied to her before. I said that I didn’t care, and I had almost fooled myself as well. I was never truly a monster though… inside I had always cared.
“Mistakes happen Faith. It’s what Giles said.”
“They didn’t happen to you though, did they B? It wasn’t you who slammed a slice of wood straight through a live guys heart.”
“Only because it was me that tossed him to you. I know that… I always knew that. Well, once the self righteous denial was over I knew that…”
Her smile wasn’t one that belittled what we had done, it was a smile that made me hear the ‘we’, in a place that I had only ever seen the ‘me’.
“…I’ve replayed that night a lot too. It was all that I could do at first.”
“Right.”
“I’m not as fast as you are now Faith, I’ve never been as fast as you are now, not even then… if it was the other way around, could I have stopped?”
I didn‘t answer. I didn’t know. We didn‘t know. “I just wanna be prepared. I don’t want to ever let that happen again.”
She couldn’t offer me reassurances that it wouldn’t. Of course she couldn’t. Not unless she really does start getting Cordy style visions, but then I know how Cordy got hers, and if I ever caught her slipping B the tongue..? Not pretty. Or maybe it would be very pretty…
Either way, I didn’t look for assurances to a future that we couldn’t see. I just accepted her hand in mine and lived in the now. Her words that spoke of facing things alone, of never wanting to face things alone again. Me or her. And I agreed. So obvious the sense that can be made when you’re no longer afraid to speak the truth. Of course I wondered just a little, wondered if we had been older and wiser then, if I had spoken my truth and she had shown me hers… would it have all ended differently? Would we have hurt each other so much?
But it wasn’t about that anymore. It gets harder to regret those times when these times are looking so much towards the up. So instead I accepted her words and sealed them with my own. Had found her hand again and walked our way home. Every single step taken, accompanied by words to bring me ever closer to her.
And it made it so sad when it had all come to an end.
In the way that evil permeates everything it touches, we could feel it bursting through the very fibres of the house. Something off kilter, something out of balance. Making our steps fall faster as we sought to find an answer to the feeling. Giles being the one to open the door with a look that said he had been waiting.
“Giles… what is it?”
“Buffy come in, there’s been… well, quite frankly we don’t really know what’s happened.”
“What do you mean you don’t know, don’t know what?”
Her voice was determined, lack of answers would not be permitted.
“It’s Willow, she’s been hurt.”
“What?” I stepped up to him with a need to urge him on. No clarity yet, just confusion.
“Xander found her, he and Anya were on their way over and they found her at the roadside…”
I exchanged looks with B, she got it about as much as I did. Not at all.
“What about Tara? Where’s Tara?”
“I had rather hoped that she was with you, Willow hasn’t come round yet, there’s a fair bit of blood loss. We haven’t a clue what happened.”
It was the cue for Xander to come bowling his way down the stairs. The dust obvious in his eyes as he took us both in. “I thought you were watching her, I thought you were watching them?”
“There was a fight…”
“Oh yeah, I just bet there was, and what was it Buff, your gooey eyes versus hers?”
“Back up there Xan, I don’t know what the fuck’s going on here, but you haven’t got any right to take a swipe at us.”
“What happened girls?”
Giles was trying to inject some order back into the moment. His voice not recriminating, just searching for the facts. Watcher tone in place as he sought the pieces to fit in the puzzle. I was with him. I wanted answers too.
“We were coming home after work, Spike showed up to warn us about another beast… then it came, it was after the witches, after Willow I think…”
Her voice trailed off so I picked it up. I knew where her head was going. In synch with mine. My fingers starting to itch as my senses buzzed with the truth.
“We sent them off with Spike, we told him to get them home. To protect them.”
“You what!? You sent them with Spike? Are you crazy!?”
And I had felt like asking the same. In the instant it had made sense… his words. He didn’t want to bring them… he wasn’t a ‘sodding baby sitter’. No. It seemed as though he was so much more. I appealed to Xander again.
“Calm it okay, there isn’t nothing getting done if you’re gonna stand there screaming.”
“What’s wrong with Will?”
“Seems like your ‘boyfriend’ helped himself to a little taster Buff, maybe now you’ve cut him off he fancied something different…”
And I didn’t mean to be on him. I really was calmer, but this wasn’t happening. I only found the front of his shirt, let the growl from my throat let him know I meant business. “Back the fuck off.”
“Faith, no.”
Her hand had settled against my back as my eyes were drilling deep into his. Pulling me away from the moment of anger. For him, for us. Mostly for Spike.
“But how could Spike have done this, I don’t understand…”
“Me neither B, maybe his chip got defuncted, doesn’t really matter.”
I turned to Giles, the only one who was speaking sense. “Is Red gonna be okay?”
“Yes Faith, it looks bad now, but it’s nothing that won’t pass, we’re just waiting for her to come round. Dawn and Anya are with her, they’ve bandaged her up.”
“Right, well that’s us then.”
“Sorry?”
“We’re out of here watcher, slayers got a job to do.”
I know my voice sounded like steel, it was meant to. If that thing had Tara… I know that he had Tara… I was getting her back. Me and B. The chance to do something that should have been done ages ago. I tried to slide a wink Xander’s way, tried to show him that it would be okay, that I was a little sorry, was feeling a little of the guilt. I could see that the dust in his eyes was blocking his view though, because all that he did was to turn his back on us and trudge back up the stairs. Back up to the girl who we were supposed to have been guarding.
“B, you ready to motor?”
“Wait Faith.”
I had wanted to scream my ‘no’. No more waiting. She wouldn’t hold me back from him again, this was it this time. The only pass that fucker had left was the one which would take him straight to hell. I didn’t know the whats or the whys, and I didn’t much care either. He would get a chance to explain in the second before I ended him, that was all that mattered. Ending him.
“No waiting Buffy, this is it. I’ll go alone if I have to.”
Her eyes had flashed an almost warning to me. An odd expression, one I couldn’t read all of the way through. “I’ll be down in a minute. Wait here.”
I didn’t speak and she didn’t speak again, just turned on her tail and took the stairs. Maybe she had to see Red first, I was just itching to go. Not looking at Giles, not looking at anything except the stake which swirled with confidence in my grasp. A truth that I knew for sure. Occupying me until she returned with a change of jacket, her face now set in a way which didn’t offer me anything other than the face of the slayer. It was okay with me, it was the face that I wanted to see.
I had followed her lead as she took us to the cemetery, questioning just once the idea that he would be stupid enough to be sat in his crypt and waiting for us.
“If he is stupid enough to have hurt Will, to have taken Tara, then he’s stupid enough to be there.”
Not much of a conversation, but it was all that there was. Everything else pushed aside until we came to be standing outside of his crypt. A familiar place now, a place which had haunted me almost since my return. I held back just the second to follow her lead, accepting that there was more here for her than just this latest outrage. Maybe a part of me, that insecure part of me, trying to read what she would do, whether she would let me bring an end to it.
I don’t know what I expected to see when we crashed our way through the door, her foot connecting hard again to send it slamming from it’s hinges, but I know I didn’t expect to see him standing there posturing, looking as if he had expected us and welcomed us. His arms held wide as he took in our advancing forms.
“Slayers, what a nice surprise.”
“Where is she Spike?”
“She? Ain’t no she here love, you’ve got yourself the wrong address.”
He was sneering at her as if he held all of the cards, as if he had something which we didn’t, yet other than Tara, he had nothing. He was nothing.
“Don’t fuck about dead boy, where’s Tara.”
I know I was snarling my own, I know that the dark place in me was all about coming out to play. But it didn’t matter now, I welcomed it, this was coming out in the right way. This was destroying evil, this was what I was here for.
“You’re gonna regret talking to me like that, thinking that you can talk down to me…”
“Just tell me where she is Spike.”
I watched as Buffy strode closer and I let her have her moment, I would take mine in a second. I was so curious to see and to hear. Wondered how she would react as his eyes slid that familiar path over the slight tight curves of her body. As his lips twisted up in a smile that promised so much more of the bad stuff to her. Making me offer my own silent promises to him.
“It doesn’t matter where she is, it’s too late for her, too late for you…”
He turned his back and walked further into the crypt. Almost dismissing us with a manner which made me wonder at whether we should be a little nervous, if we should worry about his posturing being something more than what we thought. We had been caught out once tonight, I didn’t want to be caught out again. I followed his lead slowly and made my way further inside, sneered at the pathetic self imaging I witnessed within him, the ego which made him wander around the room like an extra on a porn set. Shirt undone, pants loosely buckled.
“So how did ya do it Spikey, how did ya get the chip out?”
“Only thing you should be worried about, is how long it’s gonna take me to drain you dry.”
I was straining on a breaking leash, everything within me calling out for me to destroy him. He made me sick, everything about him, everything he stood for. The only factor stopping me from making this second his last, was the knowledge that this was about Tara. We had to know where she was. I thought of responding, of letting him know that he would never have the chance to put his mouth anywhere near me. To drain me anything, let alone dry. But I didn’t get the chance. In the time that it took me to form a solid comeback, she was at him. A solid slayer slap across his face, a resounding crack echoing through his dark and dank chamber.
“No Spike.” I saw her pull her dainty shoulders even further up, pulling at her strength. Taking the charge. “You don’t get to touch her. Now where is she, where the hell is Tara?”
“Funny you should mention ‘hell’, love. I hear the witch is getting a room with a view.”
Her fist hit him this time, smashing with force to his face. No room for open handed, when his mouth just wouldn’t co-operate. Sending him down to the floor, his expression showing not only wounded, but something else. Surprise? Shock? I don’t know…
“You hurt me…”
He was pulling himself back to standing, fingering a fucking brooch on his shirt as if it held the clues and the answers to the universe. It looked cheap and tacky to me. Nothing like my universe.
“Yes Spike, and I’m gonna hurt you again if you don’t tell me where she is.”
“I don’t…”
And she hit him again. Not waiting to hear his answer, instead slicing through the air to send him reeling back to the floor. It was enough to make him break out his game face, to have his fangs snarling at her as she took a solid stance in front of him. Enough to have me approaching her side to see if she needed the hand. A part of me hoped so. I wanted to hurt him too.
“You think that you can stop this slayer? You think that you and your slutty psycho side kick have any chance of stopping this?”
And that was my call. Not to end him, not yet, but to hurt him. My knee cracking his face as he wallowed before me on the floor. My boots forcing their way into his side as he tried to regain some ground. “Where the fuck is Tara?”
He grinned some fucked up thing at me and flipped his way back to standing. On his feet in front of us without any intent to answer. Maybe now accepting that a fight was what was coming.
“I thought this dance was gonna be easy, but I can do hard…”
His fist swung backhanded at Buffy, catching her slightly as my own thrust faster at him, between the ribs where a heart didn’t beat, breaking us out into full on war. And for a vamp he was good, his fighting like that of a street fighter, dirty tricks apparent within each of his moves. Nothing effective against us though, not at first. We were fucking slayers, did he really think that he stood a chance?
We danced our way around the whole damn crypt trading punches with punches, kicks with kicks, constantly gaining ground, working him closer to a bloody pulp with indistinguishable features. But still no end. Demanding answers every time we strode in close, his lips releasing nothing but filth and curses aimed at both of us evenly. And I never truly expected that he would be able to land one on me. Never saw the moment as his fist crashed down against the side of my cheek, blood busting out to stain my eyes, distort my vision. I wiped at them furiously, felt the rage growing stronger inside of my soul, my guts churning with a need to kill, to destroy.
“Faith..?”
Fuck that. I didn’t want to hear concern for me. I wanted to hear the slayer in her finish him for me. I caught her form through my bloodied gaze, saw as her attention went from him to me, as his hand reached out and latched onto the hair on her head and swung her around to face him. Backing her up against the solid stone wall, pushing the coldness of his dead body flush along the length of hers.
I waited for her to push him off, waited for her strength to mock that what he thought he could take. But it didn’t happen. I saw instead as she froze. The fear which laced straight through her eyes as he ground himself against her.
“Have you missed me slayer?”
His mouth encroaching on the distance to hers, as his hand slid up the side of her taut and tense body. And I got it. I saw the fucking power that he had held over her, like the bully in the playground, the abuser in the bedroom. Making her play the part of a true fucking victim. Yeah. It was fucked up, and I had seen it all. I didn’t care a fuck about bloodied gazes then, or even very much about the missing witches. This was more than that. This was every single fucker that had ever taken advantage of me, this was someone standing in front of the girl that I loved and trying to make her less. And it did spell his end.
I know the howl that I found as I launched myself at him was nothing less than primal, than survival. Ripping his body from her and tossing him across the crypt, not stopping to see that she was okay, I had forever for her, this instant was just for him. I squared up solidly, clearing my head of rage and concentrating only on his movements. Not registering the sick twisted smile that he tried to infect me with, the words which he attempted to poison me with.
“You got a little taste of the jealousy there slayer? You want me to tell you how much she liked it, how much she begged for me to hurt her… to take her harder, deeper… you want me to show you how your precious bloody Buffy likes it?”
I didn’t let it touch me. He was nothing, everything that he said was nothing.
We circled each other slowly, me knowing the outcome, him confident of his own. A first flurry of fists proving that I had the upper hand. More strength, more power, and more speed. I took each of his ribs out with focused precise movements, made his face resemble nothing more than a fucked up bloody mess. A rotting piece of road kill.
“You wanna apologise Spikey, I’ll give you the chance if you want one?”
I was taunting him with my obvious advantage. Punching him at will, trying to remember how many bones there were to break within the human body. A dead human body. I didn’t look for Buffy, I had seen the hold that he could exert over her and I took the decision to leave her out of it. I could take care of this solo. I was sure of it.
My hands were destroying him further with each second passed, until it became almost just routine. His arms breaking, his legs breaking, till finally it was just him laid flat against the coldness of stone with my knee pressed firm against his throat.
“Any last words?”
I was in the zone. The killing zone. My body demanding I give release to the buzz I had cultivated with every blow. The slayer within me demanding the final taking out of it’s prey. I was so in the zone that I flinched at her fingertips, turned without thinking and let out a warning growl.
“Faith?”
It shook my senses, the sound of my name on her lips. Lips which bled slightly from the vigour of his forced kisses. Her eyes haunted and exhausted as she looked down on the thing beneath me. I edged slowly up, not knowing why, but just knowing that I had to. Maybe to give her the moment to make her last goodbyes. His voice almost shattered my resolve. My strength.
“Buffy..?”
And I don’t even know if he could focus on her, if his eyes which looked like slits in his pulverised face had any vision left in them. I didn’t care. I only cared that his own bleeding lips were finding that smile again, the sounds of bullshit thick in his voice as he tried to fool her again with the lie that he was something other than a monster.
I couldn’t believe it as her fingers slowly reached down to caress his face, as they traced his injuries with an almost silent reverence. Couldn’t believe it and couldn’t understand it. I lowered my head and let the exhaustion I had found in beating him so severely pull me to rest against a wall. I was done. If this wasn’t his end then it was surely mine. I was spent. My insides felt wasted.
“Buffy…”
He spoke her name again. Tried to roll onto his side, but instead just winced as the blood flowed free from his cuts and his bruises. Not one of them deep enough.
“Spike, where is she. Where’s Tara?”
“It’s… it’s…too late.”
I didn’t breath, didn’t move. Just stood my distance and let the wall support me. Listened to the softness in her tone. The peacefulness of her words.
“What did you do with her?”
“I…uh…” He winced again, and she touched him again. Softly soothing him with whispers, and gestures. Encouraging him to speak again.
“…to Warren… for the chip…”
She nodded her head at him, and I just wondered who the fuck was Warren.
“Where is she?”
“Give me a bit to rest up love, and I’ll take you there myself…”
I wanted to scream. I seriously contemplated it. I’d never heard such bullshit my whole entire life, nothing that even I had spoken coming close to the levels of absolute crap he was finding to spill from his mouth. I should have ripped his throat out whilst I had had the chance. As it was, I stood there fantasising about his vocal chords laying slashed on the floor as she continued to touch him. Continued to placate him.
I know that if it had gone on any longer, I would have taken myself away. I couldn’t speak, I didn’t know what words would have made sense when everything around me had made none. I just stood there trapped in silence, watching the fucked up display that took place in front of me. Barely noticing as her hand slid inside of her jacket. As her fingers stopped caressing him and her body drew steadily back. I witnessed as the confusion flashed through Spike’s battered eyes though, getting what was happening the moment before I did. His words making a final rasp into the silence of the night.
“It won’t matter… none of this will matter, slayer.”
I watched as her arm drew back from within her jacket, admired the solid wood which sat with such familiarity within her grasp. I didn’t whoop and holler as I would have done if the wood was mine, if the blow had been mine to inflict. Instead I gave the moment the silence and respect that it deserved. Knew how very much more this had to mean to Buffy than it could ever mean to me. Her stake resting hard against his chest and nothing that he could do but to lay there and await his fate.
“It matters to me Spike. This matters to me.”
She sounded so childlike then, not like the slayer, the girl who could save the world, but ‘just’ a girl. The proof of how much it meant to her, being shown as she pushed all of her weight down upon the stake. And I swear that I heard it tear through his skin, heard it crack his sternum as it made it’s way through his busted ribs. Heard as his body in that moment turned to nothing more than dust. Like a soft whoosh, a barely there crackling. I’d never heard it so clearly before, never appreciated the beauty of the sound. What it represented. The end.
I had stayed frozen on spot. I didn’t know what to do. Just watched as she sat surrounded by the final reminder of him, staring deeply at the space which now lay open in front of her. I could see her lips silently moving again, not having a clue as to what she would be saying. What words she had to offer to the emptiness that she now touched. The stake still firm in her grasp, pushing tight against the floor. And I knew that I had to step up. Had to remind her that it wasn’t over. This had just been the beginning.
“Buffy?”
I pushed off from the wall when she didn’t answer. Made my battle weary limbs carry me the small distance to her place on the floor. “B..?”
“I did it.”
Her eyes had swung slowly to meet mine, glistening no more with happiness, but real tears. I put my hand out towards her and offered someone silent thanks as I felt the warmth of her touch slide against me.
“Are you okay?”
“I did it.”
She was standing then, her hand still in mine, eyes going back to looking at the space she had made on the floor.
“Yeah, you did it B. Great job.”
I didn’t know what else to say. I’m not always so good at the tender touching moments. Knowing how to speak softly, which words to whisper.
“Yes.” She turned to face me and I knew it didn’t matter what I said. That whatever I said would be okay. Her words beat me to it though, words I hadn‘t understood then.
“Thank you.”
“You what?”
“I couldn’t… without you, all of this… I couldn’t…”
“No way B, you did this. You found your power.”
And I really did get it then. It wasn’t about ending Spike, not like for me… it was about taking her power back. Regaining what he had tried to steal away. She was shaking her head even as my words were leaving my mouth, her hand which was holding the stake coming to rise up between us.
“No Faith. I mean it… I couldn’t have done this without you.”
She was holding the wood out to face me. Offering me her stake? I didn’t know. I took it though, felt the familiarity as it nestled firm in my own grasp. My fingers wrapping hungrily around it. And then I looked down and understood the meaning of the moment. Saw the engravings I had made with my own hand, my own knife. The gift I had offered her when I had nothing else to give.
“My stake?”
“Yes. Yours.”
“But… why? I thought you’d just toss it. Figured you had a thousand just like it.”
“Are you kidding me Faith? I think I knew that I was saving it for this… that it would come to this one day, and I knew that if I had you in my hands then I could do it.” Her eyes were shining for me again, a smile finding a way onto her face in this underground dungeon of death. “I may have found the power Faith, but you showed me the way, you gave me the strength.”
And what does a girl say to that?
This one didn’t say anything. I softly brought her round into my hold and rested my head gently against hers. Just breathed that same space of air as she did, just for a moment, a moment for us, for her. Pretended that our seconds weren’t always dictated by this duty that we were bound to fulfil. I knew I couldn’t let my mouth find hers, it wasn’t the time for that, instead letting my lips just graze across the hair upon her head. Letting my nose rub against hers in an act of innocence that would never boil over into all of the other feelings that I felt towards her.
“We had better get back. I need to see Wills, we have to get a plan…”
“Sure thing B.” I broke my hold on her body and instead let my hand find place with her hand. Gave all that I could with just one touch. Turning slowly to the door which no longer had an owner, one more crypt emptied of the undead.
“And what’s the deal with this ‘Warren’? Do you know a Warren..?”
“Yeah, we know Warren.”
I listened silently as she filled me in on the background of a boy who could never seriously hope to rule the world. He sounded like a geek, a perverted little prick of a geek… but just a geek all the same. Not someone that could rule the world. Not evil enough to be behind everything that was happening. I said as much to Buffy. Questioned the words which had come from the mouth of the dying vampire.
“I believe that it’s the truth. Whatever we know about Spike, how twisted he was… somewhere in that twisted mind Faith, somewhere he believed that he had feelings, that he…”
She couldn’t bring herself to say it, I didn’t want to hear it, and I wouldn’t make her say it.
“So that’s why with the softly, softly then? You knew he would talk?”
“Uh-huh, I guessed he would… I had to try, I didn’t want to touch him Faith, but I had to try.”
I nodded my understanding, wondered privately at how hard it must have been for her to touch him.
“So we have to find ourselves this Warren then, right?”
“Right…” She sounded a little hesitant, like her mind was going places I had yet to begin to reach.
“What is it B?”
“I don’t know, I’m just worried… if we don’t find him and Tara before Wills is back up and running… I’m sure we can take on Warren, but Willow?”
I looked at her like she was joking, remembered just a little the sight of the black eyes that Red had found for the beast the time before. It still didn‘t seem possible though. Not Willow. I couldn‘t believe that Red would ever truly side with evil, not even if she thought that it would save Tara. “You really think that that would happen? You think that Red would go against us..?”
“If she wakes up and Tara is still gone, then yeah… maybe?” Her hand had gripped a little firmer onto mine as her words found a tone close to grave. “If that happens Faith, then I’m not sure that either of us could stop her.”
It was a chilling thought. We knew that this person, wait… this Warren wanted Tara to control Willow. And now we knew that he had the Tara he needed. We had to stop him from getting the rest. I know that I sighed then. My mind so sick of finding the worry.
“You ever get sick of this gig B? This saving the world shit?”
“A long time ago. You?”
“Yeah. Totally.”
I knew that I would never stop though, knew that she would never stop either. As we rounded the corner into her street we started to talk nothing but plans. I would ring my own little gang in LA, would hurry them along, tell them how harsh the situation had now become. We couldn’t possibly wait any longer. We needed everything they had, and we needed it now. In truth we needed it yesterday. Buffy made plans to hunt down Warren. She wasn’t all ‘Red like’ with the computer, but she said that Dawn was bit of a ‘net-head’. Able to understand a lot of what Willow could do with the shiny orange lap top in the kitchen. It was a start. It was something to do whilst we hoped against hope that Willow’s injuries were just enough to keep her out of the game a little while longer. Long enough to let us rescue Tara and save the world before she could ever begin to think about destroying it.
As we had hit the steps to the porch I couldn’t help but let my mind wander back to just a few hours earlier. The question of whether I would stay here with Buffy. To be with Buffy. I knew that there wasn’t any other option now, circumstances forcing the issue for all of the wrong reasons. Not for the love, but that same old shit called duty.
I was just bringing myself to mention it. To banter a way back to maybe a joke. A comment about how I knew she would do anything to get me to stay over. But the joke died on my lips as the bushes to the side of us rustled with the sounds of an intruder. Had me spinning my head as fast as hers to witness the sight of our lost ‘boy wonder’, pulling himself up from the shrubbery. He looked like crap. Smelt like it too.
“Andrew?”
“Uh… Buffy…”
His eyes wouldn’t meet mine, had never really met mine. Always making me a little wary of his presence, his need to in listen at doors, and to sneak around houses. I never really trusted him. Still didn’t now.
“What are you doing here? Where have you been..? And why with my bushes?”
He looked like he was going to cry, his face crumbling as she asked her questions.
“I… I… it’s… it’s Tara.”
And I knew right then. I knew I was right to never trust him. His shifty little eyes spanning the ground as he dropped his gaze on her name. I didn’t give B the chance to ask more, didn’t give him the chance to move. My arm was around his throat and yanking him up off of the floor before he knew it. My boots pounding hard against the door to gain an entry.
“Faith… who on earth is that?”
Giles had opened the door, and I remembered that he hadn’t met this little asshole yet. But I didn’t have time for introductions then, I wanted every piece of information that the little goon knew, and I wasn’t averse to using pain to get it. I heard the door click behind me. Heard Buffy come take my side. I threw him down onto the sofa and set about looking scary. I had a whole lot of questions and not a lot of time to get answers. He was trembling and I was going to take advantage of that.
“Buffy..?!”
It broke the moment and made me turn towards Dawn, her excited voice crashing down the stairs much faster than her feet. She didn’t stop to register Andrew, the sight of our limbs all bloody from the two epic fights of the evening. All that she did was to rush to her sister with teenage hope and glee. Not understanding the grown up consequences. Maybe ignoring them in favour of a smile. And I knew that I just couldn’t blame her. That I would encourage her to find the smiles whilst she still could.
“What is it Dawn?”
“It’s Willow… she’s waking up!”
I felt my stomach drop. Watched as B held onto her sister, her face not finding the smile to match. Her eyes had slid up to meet mine, the dread I was feeling reflected straight back at me.
“That’s great Dawn, really…” She untangled her limbs and looked at the boy I had cornered on the sofa. “…Faith, you do what you have to do. I’ll be upstairs with Wills.”
I watched her turn and make her way. Waited until Dawn had left to go with her. Set the same look of scary back onto my face.
“Faith?”
“Giles... I wanna introduce you to Andrew, seems he’s got some things that he wants to share with us…”
He caught my look and decided not to interfere. Stood silently by as I approached the quivering form on the sofa. He had better be ready to speak, because I was more than ready to listen. And if I wasn’t listening, then I was going to be inflicting a whole lot of pain. Too much rested now upon his answers, and I knew that I wouldn’t be playing it coy.
“So where should we begin you snivelling little shit?”
“Wait… please, can I just get some water…”
His tearful gaze met mine and I resented my moment of softness. I couldn’t help it though. Maybe recognising something in his eyes.
“Giles, get him a glass of water.”
“Right.”
He looked almost pleased to be leaving the room, maybe the scary look on my face scaring him too. I softened my tone, relaxed my eyes.
“Get me one too yeah? I’m thirsty as fuck.”
I winked to accompany the words which I had never learnt to soften, pleased to see him smiling in response.
“Of course Faith.”
It wasn’t a bad option, I was a little parched, a little bit fucking exhausted. Refreshment was good. A little drink to ease the feeling. I would’ve preferred something with a kick in it, but this would do for now.
I stared across at Andrew as I sat down opposite him in the armchair. I had so many things that I wanted answers to, so many questions that he would have to face. I knew that every second counted. For Tara. For Willow. Probably for the world. I watched as he sat and nervously fingered the waistband to his pants, perhaps a nervous twitch that indicated his fear. I hoped that it would work in my favour, would have him spilling the facts on all that we needed to know.
I took slow measured breaths as Giles’s calm form returned to the room, placing the glasses down between us on the table. I was ready to begin. I only hoped that he was ready to cooperate. For all of our sakes.
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