Buffy took one look at the chaos going on below her, and immediately wished that she could turn and head away from the stairs. Maybe slide back beneath the covers of her bed, maybe slide her eyes over another of the books that she had been taking such joy in reading. Downtime. Absolute, unhindered, downtime. No immediate crisis looking to pull her back towards another apocalypse, no girl in the basement sending her mind towards all sorts of crazy.
It was a freedom that she was enjoying.
The first couple of days after Faith’s departure, Buffy had not coped well at all. Constantly tense. Waiting for the call that would signal the start of yet more hardship…
It hadn’t come though. No matter how many nightmare scenarios she had told herself to expect, none of them had come to pass. Faith hadn’t tried to kill Angel. She hadn’t hunted Buffy down in the middle of the night and finally forced her issues of revenge. As far as Buffy could tell, Faith hadn’t done much of anything. The days passing slow and the nights passing longer, until finally she had begun to relax. Her sights refocused on the world that she had saved, her thoughts refocused on what happens next…
Hence the standing high on the stairs and looking out at the chaos which reigned down below. Not even able to call it a Scooby Meet anymore, when the whole affair was being overrun by slayers. Loud and proud slayers. Each one wanting to voice their choice for the future, none of them afraid to stand before Giles and demand that they had some say now on what was occurring. Maybe the biggest say.
Buffy admired their determination. Recognised their steel; strange to once again be getting used to sharing her power.
With Faith she had resisted from the outset, had muddied the waters with the misuse of feelings - a mistake she would not be making with this new opportunity. Not a chance. The girls would not allow her to make the same mistakes.
Buffy had been certain that Kennedy was the ringleader in amongst her newest bunch of friends, and certain proof had been offered the night that she had come just a little too close to losing it. Four nights after the loss of Faith. When she had still been caught in the desolate feel of failure; when every call put through to Angel was being answered exactly the same - “No Buffy, she’s not ready to talk.”
And she had wanted to scream. She had screamed. The scythe her only companion as she had fought to find clarity in the sacrificial slaying of demons - searching out the biggest and the baddest - seeking wisdom somewhere in the seductive sounds of death. At what point tears had started to cloud her vision, she could not remember; had just known that the howling was not all from the demons anymore. The feel as more blows had landed harsh against her body. Exhausting her defences. Everything exhausted in that moment. The moment where her mouth was forced to find agape as the girls had materialised in front of her - around her - surrounding her with an unbreakable ring of protection.
“Kennedy? What are you…”
“We’ve got your back.”
As simple as that. Fighting for her. Laying to dust all of the loneliness that she had been forcing herself to feel.
It turned out that she had been oh so very wrong when she had taken the ride on the rescue bus out of Sunnydale; she didn’t have nothing left, not at all. Buffy had a legacy to build, a connection to be nurtured. A whole group of girls that needed her guidance and her leadership…
Fastening her feet forward as she smothered the small smile provoked by Giles’ loss of cool. By the indignation that sat so fierce below her, on the face of a fired up Kennedy.
“So you say England, and we all jump?! I’ve got a newsflash for ya Giles: we don’t take orders from you, we don’t want orders from you…”
“I am not ordering, Kennedy, I’m simply stating the fact that to try and establish some level of order, we need to first establish a central command centre, somewhere that-”
“You can direct and dictate and tell us all what to do?”
“No! For god’s sake woman - Willow, could you please explain to Kennedy the virtue of working together on this?”
“Come on Sweetie, listen to Giles. You know that we can go wherever we want after we’ve set up a home base. And England is nice… it’ll be fun.”
Buffy caught the younger slayer’s eyes then; marched with purpose into the centre of the confusion, the epicentre of the madness. “What’s going on?”
Twenty voices all raised at once. Each of the slayers looking to stand behind Kennedy - and poor Giles - fluttering and spluttering all alone at the side.
“Put quite simply Buffy, it’s anarchy. None of the girls will appreciate that the re-establishment of a council is vital to both their training and continued…”
“And HE won’t appreciate that none of us gives a crap! We have each other - we don’t need hangers on… people that think they can tell us what to do, and where to do it.”
And she was expected to placate this mess?
It brought about another of the small smiles. A look of amusement exchanged with Dawn, a clearing of the throat and a drawing back of shoulders.
“Giles has a point, Kennedy - we need people to do the bookwork, to sort through the prophesies… there’s the cleaning of weapons, the dressing of wounds…”
“Don’t forget the fetching of the donuts.”
“Exactly Xander, you can never underestimate the healing qualities of a well delivered pastry. Look, I know that you’re all eager to go get your slayer groove on, but the best way to do that is to be prepared - to minimise risk. To make the best use of all of your resources. Without my ‘hangers on’, I wouldn’t still be here - you should think about that Kennedy. I know it seems a strange concept that people as strong and as powerful as us should need guidance, but that’s precisely why we do need it; brawn is useless without the brains - Giles is our brain, I encourage you to use it.”
At first silence greeted her little speech giving, then Andrew stifled a sob, and Giles duly cleared his throat.
“Very good Buffy, I believe that settles the question of the travel arrangements - we will all be going to England. I’ll see to it that the reservations are made immediately.”
And that was the cue for more of the furore. Her own voice raised as heartily as the others, when a timeframe was to be decided for the mass exodus out of LA. Already accepting that she would be leaving, but still not able to take that first step, to really let go. Because letting go was a doable option when the distance was confined to the same city - but an ocean apart?
Time zones apart. A language apart.
England truly did seem like an alien nation when measured up against the things that she would be leaving behind. Buffy’s heart was in America. Could she really bear to abandon it?
That was scary in the same way that every feeling she was having towards Faith was scary. Like fate had yanked on her timeline and now everything was confused. Five years ago she had first met Faith. Four years ago she had accepted that she would never meet her again. And now..?
Now was the scary part. Not sure if a depth of feeling was quite so deep because of the confusion… like if Faith had never woken up - would she still be feeling so empty now? Or would she have offered a silent farewell and then carried on with life without thought for the past? Maybe it simply was that the loss of her home had magnified a need to find refuge in something that felt all too familiar.
“What do you say, Buff?”
Having to shake her head to re-find the focus for her eyes. Settling on Xander; not able to pretend at hearing words she hadn’t listened to.
“Say about what?”
Searching fleeting gazes to gain clues. Resting curious on Willow - wary of the caustic glare.
“Xander seems to think that we all need to stay here until Slutty Spice is feeling better again. I don’t see why we need to waste the time.”
“Slutty Spice? Did I miss the nineties girl-group revival?”
“She means Faith. And yes Will, I do think we need to stay here a little bit longer. Where would you have been if we weren’t there for you when it went all bad? Oh, wait! We’d all be dead!”
“Funny.”
“Not joking.”
And what the hell was happening now?
No curious gaze was giving her an answer. No prolonged look in anyone’s direction offering enlightenment. Just the pointed stand off between her two best friends. “Guys - you wanna explain?”
“Yeah Will. Wanna explain?”
Bringing forth more of the caustic.
“I’m not doing this! I’m sick of you trying to compare the things that I did, with what Faith did. I made a mistake Xander, something I regret - Faith is the mistake…”
“Why can’t you stop acting like such a bitch?”
“I’m a bitch? Guess I’m lucky that you have such a soft spot for bitches these days…”
And it seemed that everyone had lost their minds. Her two oldest friends - the very cornerstones of her life - were currently butting heads with the forcefulness of thunder. Because of Faith. It offered sobriety for all of her little smiles, made her face reflect the turmoil that hadn’t been dampened by distance. Still sat within the city limits.
“Can we stop this? Can we please just put a lid on it for the next five minutes? God, have you even listened to yourselves?”
Bringing sobriety to the masses.
“I think Xander makes a valid point. Like I said already; we don’t mind hanging out in LA a little longer. We want to meet Faith.”
Bringing words from Kennedy that did nothing to soften the acid tones of Willow. The disgust for her girlfriend’s statement burning brightly in her eyes.
“This is so ridiculous. I’m not gonna be a part of this - I refuse to be a part of this - I’ll be up in my room if anyone decides to maybe see sense.”
And gone.
Giles’ travel plans decimated for the day - no point in trying to talk sense with anyone, when it seemed that everybody was still losing their focus in Faith. Buffy had seen the thousand headshakes that the chaos had caused. Had waited until the others had left the lobby, and then she had looked to find her watcher. To soothe his worries. Pausing at the open door of the office to observe his sighs.
“Hey Mr Frowny Face - penny for them?”
“Ah Buffy, I’m just reminiscing on those good old days where the end of the world was all we had to worry about. I rather long for the simplicity.”
“You do?”
“Absolutely. At least against The First I felt that I had a chance of succeeding. It’s doubtful that I will ever possess the strength of will to succeed against Kennedy.”
She made her way forward as he removed his glasses; his forefingers used to rub the bridge of his nose. To grab at his tension. The edge of his desk used as a seat for her ass.
“She’s not that bad. Admittedly she has an extremely loud mouth; but her heart’s in the right place. I get where she’s coming from with Faith - they all feel the connection Giles, they’re all curious about her.”
“Be that as it may, it really isn’t a problem that we need to be focusing on right now. Angel has given us his word that he will take care of her, and I really don’t see that our continued presence here is going to do anything to influence the outcome. We have to move forward Buffy - we need to take a clear look at our situation and make plans for the future. I thought we’d agreed on this?”
And they had. She remembered nodding along to his wisdom. Wishing that she could refuse it. Yet even now, it still made sense - no matter that it meant the enactment of the whole oceans apart scenario, that her heart really would be abandoned in America - she knew most definitely that waiting around for the time that Faith was ready to talk, was not conducive to protecting the world.
“We did agree. I even agreed to the sightseeing bus tour with Dawn; but I can’t force the others to agree. Maybe you need to talk to Willow - she might be able to bring Kennedy onside.”
“Yes, because that relationship is just a blooming bed of roses right now. You’ve said yourself that you’re managing to forge a closer bond with the slayers; perhaps now is the right time to utilise that - to be their leader?”
“As long as I lead them where you want them to go?”
She vacated her seat to stride out her words. Turning to face Giles with her eyebrows raised, a little tone of authority slipping back into her voice:
“They’ve told me they don’t want to leave Faith behind, what am I supposed to do - what words do I use to tell them that abandoning her is the right way to go?”
“For starters, I’d leave out ‘abandoning’.”
“I’m not kidding Giles, they’re serious about this. Maybe I’m serious about this. How can you be so sure that she doesn’t need us?”
It certainly felt like a valid question. In amongst all of her acceptances of the last few days, Buffy had also accepted that she didn’t have all of the answers. There were still things that made her feel unsure.
“If Faith should need us, then I’m sure she’ll be able to find us; we’re going to England, Buffy, I’m not suggesting that we vacate the planet and colonise Mars. You’ll probably be shocked to learn that England has that strange invention you Americans refer to as ‘the telephone’. If Faith does need something, then she will only have to call.”
More sense?
Nonsense.
“You know full well that Faith would never call - she wouldn’t say anything, even if she did need us.”
“And that provides us with our current conundrum. We can’t wait around indefinitely for Faith to not ask for a help, that we see she needs - it’s a completely unreasonable situation. I hate to sound boring, but the world does still depend upon your services… you do still have a calling.”
As if she could ever forget.
“And how do you manage to make boring, sound like the only option available? You know you’re as bad as Willow - I was enjoying my downtime.”
She wasn’t allowed to though. The pout that she offered not changing her destiny; no amount of pining for something different doing anything to change her circumstances. She was still fate’s bitch. Misery’s mistress. Her smile of self pity already in place to welcome Giles’ words of condolences.
“I’m sorry Buffy. You deserve downtime and you will have downtime; but first we need to get back on track - we need to salvage whatever we can from the council and start afresh. We have to find the new slayers, train the new slayers…”
“Yeah, yeah - I told you I got the boring; I just don’t get the need for the urgency. Angel would surely know if there was something apocalyptic brewing - I would know if there was something crazy going down. Where’s the harm in waiting a few more weeks?”
“How many more weeks are you suggesting?”
And was there a ballpark figure for all of eternity?
“I don’t know…” Looking for something just a little more concrete, something to illustrate the overwhelming importance of her need to stay where they were. “…do you remember Giles, when Faith first went all unstable girl? She’d killed the deputy mayor, had done the near-death thing with Xander…”
“Of course I remember.”
“I told you then that I wasn’t gonna give up on her. Do you remember what you said to me?”
His blank look affirmed the no. Led her to repeat his words.
“‘Then I think she stands a chance.’ Well I think so too, Giles. I want her to have the chance.”
Buffy had treasured those words at the time, had held them close to her heart and believed in them with everything that she was. Now she had found herself believing in them again.
“Do you also remember that Faith was already looking to play the double cross by then? It rather renders my words useless.”
“Don’t say that. I don’t believe that.”
Offering him a hardened sigh as he rubbed again at the bridge of his nose. Settling back on the desk to hear his closing arguments.
“I don’t know what you do want me to say, Buffy. I have no idea if Faith will be able to redeem herself; Angel himself has no idea if she even wants the chance to be saved. Do I think that you make a difference to her condition? I’d be a damned fool to try and deny it; but that doesn’t mean it’s a good difference. You may well find that Faith does much better without your interference… isn’t that what she herself has asked for?”
It was exactly what Faith had asked for.
“Yes.” More of that acceptance sighed out. “Fine, okay - I’ll speak again to Kennedy, I’ll speak to the girls…”
She rolled her eyes heavenward as she lifted herself up, sought the strength in her shoulders that Giles expected to see. Smiling tight - a perky little wiggle of the fingers. Pausing on closing the door as he spoke to her once more.
“Two weeks Buffy - I really don’t see what good it will do, but we’ll postpone all of our plans to leave for another two weeks. I hope that it helps.”
And it did. A little bit.
“Thank you.”
A genuine smile offered then. Changing the direction of her thoughts from Kennedy to Willow, from leaving soon, to staying just a little bit longer. She instinctively knew that Will wouldn’t like it. Was maybe a little bit timid as she took the stairs up to her room.
There was tension there. It had been brewing since they had last left the boundaries of Sunnydale - since Buffy had first struggled in her efforts to carry Faith onto the bus. A little sneer that had looked to sit so permanent on Willow’s lips whenever the reawakened slayer was mentioned. And Buffy had tried - with all of the new feelings of old that she was remembering how to feel - she wanted nothing more than to go to her best friend for advice. For comfort. For some kind of understanding about all of her confusion.
Not a chance.
The sneer had sat there. Mocking in the eyes as Buffy had dared to bring voice to the things that she had shared with Kennedy. Not an ounce of sympathy.
“God Buffy. I thought you’d hit the bottom of the barrel with Spike; but Faith, for real - is this a joke?”
Rendering her speechless. Dictating that she should change the subject. Not liking the side of Willow that was exposed when her thoughts would lead her words to stray to Faith. Safer to stay away - to keep talk all light and pointless.
“…So did you visit London when you were in England? Does it really rain as much as they say it does?”
But not now. Not anymore. Buffy had only two weeks left to make anything about everything different - and she wanted all of her friends on side. She didn’t want Xander and Willow crossing swords over Faith, she didn’t want Kennedy and Willow falling apart over Faith. And she really didn’t want to fall out herself with Willow over Faith…
And what the hell was the deal with Willow and Faith?
Angel was sat pensive in his office across town, finding himself more bemused about what the deal was with Spike and Faith…
A connection seeming to instantly form the first minute that Spike had made his grand entrance through the walls to the room - shocking her into silence - having her eyes looking all confused.
“What the fuck?”
“This is who I was telling you about, Faith - I’d like you to meet Spike.”
“You’re fucking kidding me? You can’t be serious - you never said nothing about it being a ghost!”
“Boo.”
The way that Spike had stood there so uninterested, as if his whole universe hadn’t been altered by the sight of her. “So this is the bint then - I thought she’d be beefier.”
“Screw you, I just spent four years in a coma.”
“Boo-hoo?”
Rolling his eyes at her tale of woe. Looking away as she had sought to stand in his space.
“Bet I could still bust your ass, pretty boy.”
“Yeah - if I wasn’t a ghost, you moron.” Turning away, fetching his step closer to Angel. “I guess Buffy got all of the brains. So where’s the redeeming features you were blabbing on about?”
The start of a beautiful friendship.
Angel had wanted to denounce it; was still unsure that exposing Faith to Spike was really the right way to go if he wanted her to get some sanity back. A sense of goodness. But he couldn’t denounce it. Spike it seemed could mention the B word at will, and not once had Faith looked at all affected by it. He thought that it was progress, he didn’t, in any actuality, have the first clue what it was.
He had asked Spike of course. Had tried to insist that he share the words that were spoken - argued that he needed to know what was said, so that he could have a better chance of helping Faith:
“If she wanted you to know, she’d tell you herself. You can sod off if you think I’m sharing secrets with you. That wasn’t part of the deal. I help the slayer - you make me whole again. My end is going well…”
And that had been that.
And then there had been this morning. Just another normal session with Faith, trawling back through memories far, far away. Until she had looked at him a little different. Biting at her lip for an age, finally finding the words to speak:
“So what’s the deal with Spike - did he really get his soul back, just to impress Buffy?”
And that’s when he had been shocked himself. He hated to admit it; but maybe Spike really did have a touch with slayers? Something he contemplated now - something he hadn’t wasted time on this morning. Following Faith’s direction so carefully, guarding each of his words.
“Is that what he told you?”
“Yeah, pretty much. Said he tried to hurt her real nasty, and then he went and got his soul back. Is he shitting me?”
“That’s the basic story. He thought that doing the demon trials would win Buffy’s heart - that if he had his human soul…”
“Did it work?”
“In a way, yes. She told me that he was in her heart - I don’t believe that she was ever in love with him though. I hope not anyway.”
“Because you still have the tragic hang-ups for her?”
“No, because Spike is an idiot. Buffy deserves better.”
He had let her fall silent. Hadn’t exclaimed any of his joy at what he saw as progression, hadn’t browbeaten her into progressing any further. She had done that again on her own. Maybe with Spike’s help - he was still contemplating.
“Angel, wait?”
Calling him back as he had sought to give her some peace.
“What is it?”
“Maybe you could - I dunno. Can you give the X-man a call? Ask him if he’d come by and see me, tell him to bring some new comics.”
Not able to hide the silent pride in his eyes.
“Of course I will.”
“It’s probably a fucked up idea - doubt he’ll wanna see me anyway, I wouldn’t wanna see me…”
Leaving her to babble on at the walls as he had almost victory danced his way into the elevator. Mindful not to crow too early - not to tempt fate in the worst ways. It was a breakthrough that he had not expected; not at all sure what had provoked the easiness in her words, whether she would progress to allow him to talk about the bad times.
Whether she had already spoken to Spike about the bad times.
Just sat pensively. Waiting for the moment that she would come out of her shell and stay there. Hoping against hope that today had been the first day on her path towards redemption. He had pushed too fast too soon before, and this time he was determined to travel at Faith’s pace. Not pushing the Sunnydale issue if she was happy to tread there herself - not doing anything other than devising ways for her to start feeling useful again. Like she was living again.
Like she was a slayer again.
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