Chapter 4: B and the PtB – Redux
THIRD FLOOR HALLWAY– NEXT MORNING – 7:30 AM
KENNEDY’S POV
A slow smile creeps to my lips as Will and I watch them sleep from the doorway. Buffy’s face is buried in Faith’s neck, a protective arm wrapped around her Dark Slayer’s waist. This is probably the first time Buff’s really slept since Faith got back, and I don’t mean two weeks ago. Damn did she need it. Faith looks 1,000 times better than when we left last week: some color in her face and down to only the IV, now that’s progress. Hopping the red-eye last night was a bitch, but seeing them both safe and happy right now is totally worth it. I turn to Will and see her own relieved grin. Tilting my head away from their room, Will nods and we retreat to ours.
It was a rough week in Seattle. Sara’s parents were great, considering. We helped out as much as possible. Andrew even found a funeral home run by a family of Lister demons – go figure, I guess they got away with the grey skin cause it rains so much there. Regardless of what they look like, they knew exactly how to fix Sara up to make her presentable to her family. The arrangements were beautifully seen to and it was greatly appreciated by her parents. Of course we took care of the bill, but who really cares about money when something like this happens?
We hadn’t made this kinda trip in a while. No matter how much I want to say it’s because of the training or all we’ve learned over the years, I know I’m not that naive. In this fight, sometimes our people die. Buffy said it best years ago, ‘War is about death, needless, stupid death.’ And this war against evil will never end.
Our losses have been remarkably few and far between for quite some time. That’s why losing Sara and Martin like that was such a rude awakening. It kinda makes me feel –
“Kennedy?” Willow puts her hand on my arm.
I didn’t realize I’m just standing there, in the middle of our room, lost in my thoughts. “Huh?”
She narrows her eye, “You ok? Kinda lost you for minute,” she points to the suitcase I still have in my hand.
Dropping my bag I turn to her, “Yeah, just tired and spacing.”
“You sure?” I know she doesn’t buy it for a second.
Stepping closer, I pull her into a hug, “I have a bad feeling, Will; like we’re going to be making more trips like this one. We’ve been too lucky too long.”
Willow runs her hands through my hair then turns my face to hers, “I hate to say it, but from what I’ve seen of the Prophecy, you’re probably not wrong.”
Leaning my forehead against hers, I gently sigh, “That’s what I’m afraid of: for once in my life I don’t want to be right.”
She takes my hand and leads me to our bed, “Come on, cat-nap first then we’ll regroup with the others, ok?”
Nodding to her, we undress and slip under the covers. I don’t realize how tired I am until my head hits the pillow, but I can’t shake this foreboding. “Do you feel it at all? Like something’s different this time?”
Will snuggles up close, “Yes, I do. But I also know you’re worn-out and haven’t had time to deal with your own feelings about losing Sara.” She looks up and kisses me, “Rest now, we’ll talk more later, ok?”
“If it wasn’t for the fact that you’re right, I’d probably be really irritated with you right now,” I pull her into my arms.
My redhead just laughs softy as I allow myself to let sleep finally take me.
FAITH & BUFFY’S ROOM – 10:00 AM
BUFFY’S POV
My lips are pressed up against Faith’s neck when I wake. It isn’t until I kiss that deliciously smooth skin I realize I’m not dreaming and she’s actually sleeping beside me. I try to move but her arm reflexively pulls me into her, and now moving seems to be the furthest thing on my mind.
One year! It’s been more than that to be honest; over one year since I’ve woken up next to her, since I’ve felt her arms around me, since we kissed, since we made love. Gods how I’ve missed her, I don’t know if I can handle another separation that long. Trailing my finger down the side of her face I notice how tired she still looks. The woman has slept for weeks but she still looked exhausted.
I’m really not looking forward to leaving her for a couple of hours to see the Powers. They still kinda freak me out. But I know we need answers and if I don’t go, Faith will drag herself there. I chuckle to myself at the picture of just that in my head.
“What’s so funny?” She murmurs.
Smiling, I lift my head, “Good morning gorgeous.” Controlling the burning desire to ravage her, I lightly kiss her lips.
“I don’t feel so gorgeous. And if you’re gonna kiss me like I’m your sister, then I must have lost something in my travels.” She peers up at me, her trademark smirk growing.
Swooping down to give her a slightly less chaste kiss I offer, “Yeah, well, we’ll see about anything more than that once the Love-Gestapo has given you a clean bill of health.” Propping my head on my hand I search her eyes, “How do you feel?”
“A lot better than yesterday,” she closes her eyes and stretches. My other hand that’s resting on her stomach takes a little trip to her chest as her tank top rides up. My eyes roll back then close. God, she’s trying to kill me here. Her hand snags the IV line and she’s caught up in it, “Fuck, I’m stuck”.
I lean over her and untangle the line, “Maybe Emma can take this out today.” Sliding out of bed, I turn back to her, “You hungry?”
Faith looks me up and down, “Hell, yeah.”
“Stop it; you’re going to get us in trouble.” Laughing, I walk over to the door, although away from her is not really where I want to be, “Sophia said you can start out with a light breakfast, so scrambled eggs and toast, ok?”
Faith looks at me for a long moment, just taking me in as I had done to her when she was sleeping. “I missed you so much.”
I race back to her side and sit on the edge of the bed next to her. “You’re not allowed to be gone so long again, ok?” Taking her head in my hands, I bend down and brush my lips over hers, taking in the feel of her mouth melting against mine. I start to feel my heart pound in my ears. It takes all my strength to pull away.
A little out of breath she looks up at me and smiles, “Ok.”
“Good,” I caress her cheek then get up again, “I’ll be right back with breakfast and coffee.”
As I make my way downstairs I realize how quiet it is; shouldn’t classes be on? Then it dawns on me that I have no clue what day it is. Shaking my head, I open the swinging door to the kitchen to find, well, basically everyone around the table having breakfast.
“Buffy,” Dawn jumps up and gives me a hug. “How’s Faith? We wanted you two to sleep in so we were keeping it quiet here in the kitchen. Is she ok? Is she hungry cause there’s plenty already made - ”
“Whoa, down girl,” I laugh, “She’s ok, still beat, but hungry, I’m taking it as a good sign, right Sophia? I’m just gonna whip up some eggs, toast, coffee.” I look over to onsite doctor.
Sophia purses her lips, “I don’t know about the coffee, but I know Faith’s an addict, so it’s not like you’re going to listen to me anyway. But you should give her some juice too. After she has breakfast and lunch, we’ll see about taking out the IV.”
I blow out a sigh of relief, “That would make her very happy.” I take the eggs out of the fridge and start breaking them open into a mixing bowl. While I’m beating them I turn back to everyone. “I know this is going to sound really stupid, but what day is it? I kinda lost track.”
Nicky giggles then leans into Emma for protection seeing me turn to her and lift my eyebrow. She peeks out again with a small smile when she hears me chuckling.
Will smiles, “It’s Sunday Buff. Emma and Sophia were just filling us in on all the haps.”
“Oh, so that’s why it’s so quiet.” I butter the pan and pour in the eggs. “When did you guys get in? I didn’t hear anything.”
Ken gets up, pops a couple of slices of bread in the toaster oven then leans against the counter, “About 7:30, we looked in on you guys, you were out cold.”
“Yeah, we totally passed out last night, found new meaning to the word ‘beat’.”
Dawn leaned back into Andrew, “And that’s why we were letting you sleep in. Emma said you’re going to see the PtB today. You want me to go with you?”
“I’m taking her,” Emma speaks up firmly ending any discussion on the matter. Everyone looks at her then me. “Don’t even, Buff, you’re not going alone, I’ll wait in the car.”
Nodding at Em, “Yeah, it’s actually a good idea. No offense Dawn, but I don’t think any of us should be running around for a while without backup.”
“None, taken,” Dawn sips at her coffee, “I completely understand.”
Ken turns to me, “I’ll take the ride too. That way I can keep Em company while we wait for you to come out.”
“Sounds like a plan, we’ll go after lunch.” Ladling the eggs into a big plate I grab the toast, butter it then turn to Emma and Nicky, “Come on you two, you’re on beverage patrol, Emma can you get the coffee? And Nicky, you can manage two glasses of juice, right?”
They jump up and see to their duties as I get big smiles from the rest of our little group. “What, what’d I do?”
Andrew shakes his head, “Nothing Buffy, I guess it’s funny, you know,” he waves his hand between Emma, Nicky and me, “Like this is how it’s always been.”
I look at the girls busy at their tasks then back to the faces of my friends, no, my family, sitting at the table, “Yeah, it’s nice, isn’t it? If it could only stay this way...”
INTERSTATE 271 SOUTH, EXIT 19 – 2:45 PM
KENNEDY’S POV
“You’re kidding me with this neighborhood, right? The fucking PtB couldn’t afford better that this?” I look around for a spot, then find one a few doors down from the beat up abandon house Buffy picks out as the one.
Buff laughs, “I asked Faith the same thing, and actually that is the reason. They don’t have access to money. She said because they’re incorporeal, they can easily ‘haunt’ a house and people will stay away. So all we have to worry about are the crack heads.” She takes a deep breath then turns to us, “I don’t know how long I’ll be but if anything happens just call my cell and I’ll come out.”
Ok, she looks really stressed out. “You ok, Buff?”
“Yeah, yeah,” she pats my hand, “they just freak me out, always have. Knowing them, I won’t be long.” She gets out of the back seat and closes the door. We watch her disappear into the dilapidated building then begin our vigil.
I look over at Em, “Do you have a bad feeling about this too, or is it just me.”
She meets my gaze then nods slowly.
Sighing loudly, I rest my head back and close my eyes. The nap this morning did some good, but I feel like I haven’t slept in ages, maybe because I can’t seem to anymore. “Tell me about Nicky. How’s she been this past week?”
Emma looks up at me, “Amazingly well actually. She said her parents told her when and how they were going to die. So as soon as she got over the initial shock, she pretty much was ok. Although she sticks to me like glue, me or Faith.”
I think for a minute, “How is she with Buffy?”
“A little guarded, but she’s that way with Sophia too. I’m guessing it’s cause of the hybrid thing going on. And Buffy, well, kinda looks like her mom.” Catching my wide-eyed look, “She really does, Nicky showed me a picture.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah, Buff is trying to hang back and let Nicky come to her.”
I nod, “Sounds like a good idea.”
“There’s one other thing, she’s also kinda clairvoyant.”
“Kinda?” I laugh, “Like kinda pregnant?”
She joins me, “Yeah, well, she’s going to need to spend time with Willow once things settle down. She’s got the mojo from her Dad, and Martin was incredibly powerful. He put her through a pseudo training schedule while they were on the run. But he didn’t know how to focus the Slayer part of her. So I guess she’ll need plenty of time with you too. And if you thought I was precocious, let me tell you, you ain’t seen nothing till you talk to her.”
Opening the door, I tilt my head for her to come outside with me. We lean up against the car and stare down the crack heads starting to venture our way. After seeing our body language they shrink back to the shadows. “What about her mom? Was she an Empath demon like yours?”
“Yeah, she really knows how to cloak; being on the run, it had to be a necessity.” Turning to me she continues, “You know, it’s really weird that her parents and mine were both killed when we were 8. Do you know when Faith’s parents died? I know she was young, but she never talks about it. I think it’s another connection.”
Shaking my head, “We don’t talk about her childhood. There’s like a big ‘STOP’ sign there so I never bring it up.”
Emma jumps up on the hood of my car, swinging her legs back and forth. She’s probably thinking about how to ask Faith about her parents. Yeah, well good luck with that.
“Em?”
She turns to me, “Uh-huh?”
“Are you scared?”
She looks back down at her feet, “You mean scared that Buffy is going to come out of there and tell me it’s time for me to be the PtB’s Champion?”
“Yeah.”
Sighing, she looks over to me, “It’s not like I didn’t know it was coming. I made a deal and I know there’s no going back on it. I talked to Faith about it whenever she was here, you know, trying to prepare. So I don’t think scared is the right word.” She’s quiet for a moment, returning her gaze to the ground. “Tell you one thing; I’ll be really disappointed if I don’t finish med school. That would suck.”
I can’t help but roll my eyes and laugh, “God, you are such a geek. The only thing you’re worried about is school?”
“I am not a geek!” She counters indignantly then stops to think about what she just said. Emma bites the side of her lip, “Alright, maybe I’m a little geeky.” She cagily looks back at me, “But geeks are cool; Willow, Dawn and Andrew are all geeks.”
“Yeah, yeah, and Sophia too; I’m freaking surrounded by you guys. Thank God Faith’s back, Buffy and I can’t hack it alone anymore.” I deadpan, but I can’t help the smile.
“Oh, you,” she punches me in the arm and we erupt into hysterics.
When I lift my head, I see Buffy striding towards us. Damn it, she’s been crying, this can’t be good. Emma sees her too now and slides off the car as Buffy wraps her arms around her neck. Em returns the hug, allowing Buffy to sob quietly into her. Fuck.
Buffy steps back and wipes her tears as a smile crosses her lips. Looking up, she takes Emma’s face in her hands, “It’s not what you think, honey. Come on; let’s go home, we need to talk to Faith.” She opens the back door and slides in, “And when did you get so tall?”
Ah, the plight of the vertically challenged...
FAITH & BUFFY’S ROOM – 2:45 PM
FAITH’S POV
“These are his notebooks.” Nicky hands her father’s marble composition books over to me. Damn, people still use these? I thought I was the only throw-back who actually still wrote words with pen and paper. I thumb through them, shaking my head.
Looking up I catch Red’s eye, she comes over and takes them, “Willow here is going to read through them. She’ll give them back to you once she’s done, ok?”
Nicky nods, “Ok.”
Red sits back down and holds them in her lap. She wants to talk, I can feel it. “Hey Nicky?”
“Yeah?”
I tilt my head over to Andrew and Dawn, “Why don’t you let these guys show you how we know where all the Slayers are?”
Her eyes get wide then she turns to them, “You know where everybody is, like in the whole word?”
Dawn smiles as she nods, “In this world yes.”
“But we’re working on others.” Andrew adds.
“Really? Wow.” The kid is impressed. But her brow furrows as she realizes she’ll be alone with them.
Needing to reassure her, “Nick, you’re safe here. Andrew made this house a fortress; nothing can come in that we don’t want in, ok? I’ll be right here. Red and I just want to talk alone; we haven’t seen each other for a long while.”
Steeling herself, she takes a deep breath then follows them downstairs to their office. Damn, she’s such a little trooper.
“Feel like talking about the Prophecy?” Red ventures unenthusiastically.
“Not so much.”
“Good, neither do I.” She pulls her chair closer to me, “How are you feeling, Faith?”
I lean back against the headboard, “Really fucking tired, Red.”
“It’s been a long, hard year.”
“It’s been a long, hard life.”
Will cocks her head to the side, “Yeah, that too.” She regards me for a moment then sighs, “Ever feel like ditching it all and jumping to another dimension where no one ever heard of vampires or demons or prophecies? Finding a place where we could just be us, and live without the weight of the world on our shoulders.”
“Only every day, but I know I won’t.”
She nods solemnly, “Me too.” She sighs again, “It’s all because of the spell you know, the one I did in Sunnydale.”
“What do you mean?”
“None of us should have lived this long. No one knows how to handle pressure like this: the constant danger; the constant death; the stress on our families, friendships, lovers; Goddess, even the power gets too much sometimes. Buffy’s been flying all over the world trying to keep the Slayers sane.” She stops then glances out the window. “A lot of them are asking to have their powers taken away.”
“Jesus, you’re shitting me.” I can’t believe it. There’s no way I could imagine not being a Slayer. As tired of this shit as I am, it’s a part of me as much as my legs are.
“Andrew perfected the drug used by the old council for the Cruciamentum. You know what that means in Latin, by the way? Torment. The old bastards, the only good the First did was blowing those fuckers up.”
It’s been a while since I heard a Willow-babble-athon. I raise my eyebrows at her.
“Yeah, ok, calming down now, anyway, the drug is a combo muscle relaxant/adrenal suppressor that, used along with a spell I worked out with the Coven, removes all traces of a Slayer’s power, permanently.”
“Holy shit,” still reeling, a thought comes to me, “When did this start happening?”
Red leaned forward, “Faith, please don’t get angry, Buffy didn’t want you to worry, you kinda had enough going on you know?”
“When, Red,” I try to say it with the most patience I can muster.
She pushes out a breath, “It’s been a few years, at first it was just the sleepers, they couldn’t deal and wanted out. But more and more, the active ones are calling in to talk over options with her. You know, weighing the pros and cons. Kristen’s been helping the last couple of years.”
I rubbed my forehead knowing it was ringing a bell somewhere, “Wait, the Swiss girl Buffy talked-down from a freak out right before Christmas when I first came back?”
“That’s the one,” Red laughs for a second then looks at me before plowing right on. “The two of them have had their hands full. We’ve lost a little over 200 so far. Kennedy and Buffy are trying to figure out a way to help them cope, but it’s hard, cause sometimes, well, we don’t cope so well ourselves, you know? Bottom line is there just aren’t enough Watchers to help them accept who and what they are.”
“Fuck, Willow, someone should have told me.”
She gets up and walks over to the window. Turning back to me, she asks wearily, “And what would you have done Faith? Really, what could you have done? You weren’t even in the same fucking dimension.”
Rising up in bed, “That’s not my fault. I had to find Nicky!”
She smiles at me and returns to her chair, calmly stating “I know; that’s why Buffy said not to tell you.”
“GOD DAMN IT!” Completely frustrated because I know she’s right, that Buffy was right not to tell me, I slam the back of my head against the headboard. “Oh...ouch.”
Red jumps up and leans over me inspecting my head, “Shit Faith, Buffy and Sophia are going to line up to kick my ass if you hurt yourself. Are you ok?”
“Yeah,” I sigh dejectedly, “it’s just... sometimes it feels like no matter what I do, I feel like it’s never enough, like I’m running in quicksand.”
She sits again, “You can’t be everywhere or do everything, I tell that to Ken all the time.”
Holding her gaze I feel my walls slowly slip down, “I know; I just wish I wasn’t torn in so many directions. I’m so tired Willow: of running from one place to the next, of not spending any time at home, of missing out on everybody’s life, hell, my life. I just don’t think I can do it anymore.”
“You won’t have to baby.” Buffy is leaning against the door frame with Emma and Nicky beside her. “Wills, can you excuse us for a minute? We need to talk to Faith.”
