Chapter Nine.
Xander had hung back from all of the excited girlyness, when the happy shoppers had finally made their way back to the hotel. He wasn’t one for talk of high fashion, he didn’t care so much which pants Willow had bought him, whether his new shirts matched his new socks or not. What he did care about though, what he absolutely cared about, was the package he held now, safe and secure beneath his arm.
The ’very secret mission’ to the comic store had been a welcome success, everything that he had wanted they had in stock, and now he felt ready to face Faith with something meaningful. Something to distract the mind that he had witnessed as it had broken beneath them.
He didn’t have excuses for all of the things that Faith had done before, for any of the acts that they had all been so happy to label as psychotic, he didn’t know her reasons - he didn’t know much of anything when it came to her lures and her pushes - but he did know about second chances. About forgiveness. About remembering the person who had existed before the darkness had reached out to claim them.
With Willow he had connected through memories of breaking that pesky little yellow crayon back in kindergarten, with Faith he was hoping a connection resided somewhere in the pages of Contagion and Cataclysm. He hoped that he could rescue her spirit with the added enticement of No Man’s Land. Yeah. Xander Harris was putting all of his faith in the Caped Crusader.
A thought which made him shake his head still with a little breath of bemusement; he had always been a Marvel man, a firm subscriber to the philosophy that The Hulk could kick Superman’s skinny ass any day of the week. That the X-Men far outweighed any of the offerings from the DC side of the tracks… but then he remembered those meetings which were ignored in the library. How he had smoozied over to Faith one afternoon, all full of boyish charm, all full of glazed eyes and happiness hormones, asking what it was that she was reading;
‘Whatcha reading Faith?”
Putting himself into her space, encroaching his ass on the desk where she rested her boots. Upping the volume as her attention never waned from the comic she was engrossed in. ‘Anyone in there?’
Starting to tap the back of the magazine until she ceased her reading, those dark brown eyes flirting with dangerous as she had finally let her gaze come to rest on him. ‘Do you have a reason for bugging me? Shouldn’t you be off somewhere, learning something?’
Her hands flitting as if at a fly, trying to ease him away. But then, Xander was controlled by the hormones, he hadn’t heard a word. His hand reaching out again to touch the comic, turning it round to look, to see, to spark a debate that had raged right up until the time when she had defected and left them.
‘Batman!’His voice high pitched in its disbelief. ‘You’re tainting Giles’ library with the evil DC?! Do you know how wrong this is?’
‘Don’t diss the DC, dude, you gotta have respect for Batman, the guy’s a legend…’
‘The guy has a utility belt! What kind of superhero has nothing but a utility belt?’
‘Add in the bitchin’ hi-tech underground lair, top of the range surveillance equipment, crazy assed car… I dunno Xander, a damn good one?’
‘Madness!’He remembered covering his ears in mock shock, the way her eyes had lit up as she launched into the spiel on what was happening in the city named Gotham. All the bad crap, the background to Contagion, how it led into Cataclysm. Showing him the issue she was reading then, getting him hooked with the way she wrapped her lips so sensuously around the story. The dark bits seeming real, the bad bits coming to life. ‘Okay… so Batman has potential. I can admit that the story *might* sound exciting…’
‘No way man, it’s totally wicked. Kicks serious ass.”
‘Yeah, whatever. Everyone knows that X-men kicks ass, anything else is just trying for second rate…’
The light in her eyes growing, the smile on her face widening. ‘Ya know… for a nerd you don’t know shit. Next you’ll be going down The Hulk versus Superman route…’
‘Whoa! Okay, you can stop right there Faith. I can cope with the disturbing love for Batman, he’s all dark and broody, and I know how that *always* gets the girls. But no way, I’m not taking the Hulk slurs. He’d serve up Superman’s ass on a platter any day of the week, any comic fan with any sense knows that.’
‘Anyone with any sense would know that Hulk is nothing more than a moron with muscles. You’re deluded. It’s bad. I kind of liked you too… shame it had to end this way.’
And he had stayed, and they had bantered. He had flirted, she had gifted him with the odd flash of her eyes, the odd teeth gripping her lip, sending her gaze sliding slowly down over his form. Yeah. He definitely remembered those kind of days. He hoped for something similar now. Not the flirting - he was not looking to revisit that slice of past with Faith - but the easiness, the banter. Reminding her of the fun that could be had when she was good. Before she was bad.
The basement sat coated in the same gloom, the same dank and dirty aroma that had caked every single minute since Faith had been stuck down there. Imprisoned down there. It was a feeling that was eating away at her insides, giving that hatred some more points to add to her bulletin board, more fuel to the fire of payback, more and more retribution to be gainfully harvested.
At least knowing now that she was in LA, offered some level of comfort. It was a city, it was a great big fuck off city; the kind of place she could lose herself, the kind of place she could find escape. Yet the bars were made with magic, and the door wasn’t opened unless a crossbow was pointing up into her face. It was bullshit. And it more than fuelled the rage that set out the plan. More than fuelled her hunger for the game.
She was going to play Buffy, and she was going to beat Buffy. It was the only thing that she demanded of herself now. The thing that held her tongue in place as she ached to scream out her imprisoned frustration, the thing that kept her arms by her sides all the time that she wanted to pound out a rhythm against the bars that would not break. Control. It was about control. Who had it. Who used it.
Buffy thought that she was in control, that a piece of wood pointing up in Faith’s face was enough to tame the hatred that ran in rivers through her veins. Not a chance. Faith was in control. Quiet, calm and measured control. She remembered the dipping green, she remembered the tinted pinks.
She refused to remember a time when those colours were her favourite colours though. When Sunnydale was a Sunny slice of heaven, instead of a shafted slice of hell. No. She focused only on the things that were important, the things that had become important with the passing of days, with the widening of the abyss that had ripped open so destructively between the two slayers. Buffy just so damn good, and Faith, just so damn bad. And she could do that, she could be bad. She *was* bad. She remembered.
Bad. Wicked. Evil. The smirk grabbing her lips as she thought through all of the bad, wicked and evil things she wanted to do to Buffy. Her eyes dipping dark as she contemplated Buffy wanting her to do those things. What the flush asked for, what the pinks hinted at.
She may be behind bars, they may have caged the beast; but none of them had come close to taming her demons. All they had done was to feed them. Offer them the sanctuary to recover, the room to grow. To multiply. To take back control.
He waited until after dinner to search out the steps to the basement again. Xander hadn’t discussed his idea with anyone except for Andrew, and he wanted it to stay that way. Knowing that once everyone was fed, they would be drifting off and out - seeking something energetic to do - made him feel secure in his planning of stealth. His only obstacle had been Buffy… sat in front of the screen again, staring at the screen again, yet the screen was still bathed in blackness.
“Hey Buff, you know it’s not switched on ,right?”
Wondering if one rolling eye was as good as two as she turned to face him, as he sought to tease her tentative smile higher. “It’s that button there; I think it’s called ‘on’, works for ‘off’ as well.”
“Do you have one?”
“You wanna turn me on?”
“Definitely no. I was thinking more the turning off… and that doesn’t work so well either, does it?”
And the smile was fixed in place. Her shoulders relaxing as she span in her chair to face him properly, her feet raising to prop up on the desk. “I can’t decide if we should turn it back on or not. I want to know what she’s doing… but then that seems all kinds of stalkery. What do you think?”
He think? He thought that she should take her mind away from the idea of Faith for more than five minutes, maybe take some interest in the world that she had saved yet again just the day before yesterday. “Why don’t you take a break? I know the girls are all getting set to go out somewhere, why don’t you go with them?”
“They’re going out?”
“Yep. Willow said something about expanding the fun, keeping the bonding going.” Her green eyes all aglow with the chatter of shopping, of the normal days fun that they had all managed to enjoy. “You could go bonding.”
“Yeah. I’m not really in the bonding mood.” Buffy’s green eyes nothing like aglow. Just kind of tired, her shoulders still sinking down; not in relaxation, but close to a slump. “If they’re all going out, I guess that leaves me to go slay.”
“More slaying?”
“Uh-huh. You wanna come?”
Xander weighed up the idea of slaying against the idea of comics and lengthy philosophical debates on all things green and hulk like. It was an easy answer. “I’d love to - but, with the patch, the lacking of night vision…” He shrugged, smiled. “…you mind if I sit this one out?”
“No, go for it. I’m probably not the best company anyway.”
And Xander would have to have no eyes to miss the sigh that slipped from her lips, the way her gaze cast back towards the screen. Again. “I bet Faith would come slaying.” The air of petulance that wrapped around her mouth in a pout. It passed quick, barely there, but he was watching.
“Sure she would Buff, but I doubt it’d be the demons she’d be looking to go four years of frenzy on.”
“Yeah. That’s a definite negative.”
Her lips curving back up into a smile. Her eyes just a little bit aglow. They were things which made him ponder, made him ask the question which came to him as obvious. “Would you though Buff? I mean, slay with Faith again. Would you want to?”
Her eyebrows dipping before him, her gaze seeming to deepen with an unknown edge of intensity. There was a curious quality to the tone of her voice when she spoke, as if she wondered at what it was that prompted the question, whether he had been privy to all of her secret and silent thoughts. “Why you asking?”
“Curiosity?”
Making her shoulders shrug a little, her gaze staying steady. “Obvious answer - no way. She’s dangerous, unpredictable, unrestrained. She has *no* attention span when it comes to what’s going on around her…” Slipping to monotonic as the list carried on. It dampened the glint in her eye, eased off on the intensity. Right up until she got to the truth. That point where Xander felt as if he had been measured up, and accepted. Like she trusted him enough to tell him. “…but the honest answer - the one that stays strictly between me and you?”
He nodded his offering of privacy.
“Yeah. I’d love to. It’d be a blast… all of that old fire, all of that excitement. I swear Xander, she makes me forget who I am when we’re slaying. When we were in the thick of it, I don’t know… it was like nothing else existed…”
“And that’s good?”
Eyes wide, pupils dilated. “It didn’t suck. It’s…”
Not knowing the names for every feeling that flitted across her face as she thought through her words, but he sure as heck knew some of them. He recognised the flush of exhilaration, the fidgeting fingers of anticipation.
“…it’s like freedom. Like flying.”
Treating him in that moment to a full on Buffy Summers special, the kind of smile that you carried in your memory forever, that you treasured. Something that was incredibly intense.
“Wow!” Filling him with a little of the buzz, his own blood racing. “*I* wanna be a slayer. You think, with the scythe… Wills could…”
“No.”
“I could be the one eyed slayer! I’d be a legend, I’d be…”
“No!”
He laughed. She laughed. She sighed. He stopped. No exhilaration, no anticipation; just yearning. He didn’t know whether for times gone by, for times wished for, but he did know that it was yearning. He remembered the Buffy and Faith show, of course he did, he’d get off on it for days afterwards, every single time that he’d gotten to see it. The way they trained together, the way they slayed together. He didn’t wanna go to that place where he thought about them dancing together. Nope. Four years hadn’t done anything to dull *that* slice of still ripe memory. He remembered the show though, and he could understand the yearning. All of the Scoobs were Buffy’s friends, all of them had been closer to her than Faith had ever managed… yet none of them ever came close to the bond that had existed between the slayers in those final weeks before madness.
Willow had been obsessed by it, giving him looks every time Faith had appeared to drag Buffy so easily away from them, every time that Buffy had knowingly blown them off to go do *slayer* stuff with Faith. He had just enjoyed the show. Complimenting them when he got the chance to wander in on an impromptu training session, standing back in open adoration when they went slay crazy on an unfortunate band of undead.
“You really miss her, don’t you?”
Another question asked as obvious.
“Hey, what’s with you and all the questions? You’re funny guy; not serious guy. You’re not allowed to change!”
“I’m still funny guy! It’s just these new pants - Willow bought them way too tight… they’re stifling me.” It was the truth. She *had* bought him a size lower than he had worn for the last year or two. Maybe three.
“I’m not helping to take them off.”
“You might have to. It’s gonna need slayer strength.”
“Then ask another slayer.”
He contemplated which one he might like to ask. Xander had envisioned a couple of those moments too. Pillow fights and girl on girl action. Girl on girl on him action. There was lots of action. “You think I should ask two? As back up.”
Making Buffy laugh again, making her eyes glow again. No chance of directing her back towards his question though. And it was a good thing that he already knew the answer. He didn’t need to press her, to pin her down and force admissions from her throat. He had looked, and he had seen the truth.
Yeah, Buffy missed Faith. And he realised then, he accepted then, that he kind of missed Faith too.
The only problem with sitting back, retreating, and letting your demons take back control, was that sometimes the cracks still shone through. In moments when you felt most guarded, when you were sure that nothing could ever happen to shake your steadying foundations, something like a Cataclysm came along and rocked the fuck out of your world. At least that’s how it seemed to Faith. She had been so set on her snarl, so lost in the delusions of fantasies she wanted to incorporate into her revenge, that her eyes had barely raised when Xander had first walked slowly down those stairs. She hadn’t been expecting Xander, was only prepared to take on Buffy, and it had allowed the light to switch back on. The growl silenced by surprise.
“Xander, what’s up?” Forgetting for that moment that a cage still surrounded her; just smiling again at the funny little patch, responding to the ease that shone through his gaze.
“Hey Faith, I come bearing treasure.”
“Treasure..? You’re taking the pirate thing serious now?”
“If the patch fits.” To the smile that lifted his lips as he stepped his way closer. It made Faith step closer too, edginess slipping away as she sank her arms to rest against the bars. To listen to his words. “You’re looking better today.”
And finding her own smile. “Yeah, amazing what a shower can do. I feel almost human again.”
“A shower? Did I miss something?”
“Hot running water. Lots of soapy suds. Crossbow pointed in my face.”
“Buffy let you out for a shower? She was… *with* you, while you took a shower?”
And damn! She would forget her demons forever if real life really was this funny. The bulk of manhood not hiding the boy as Xander flushed red with the imagery. Not even meaning to think it; but really? Buffy had taken Faith for a shower?
He wanted details. Not necessarily the horny kind. Just… Buffy had let Faith out for a shower?
“Sure thing Xander. I needed someone to wash my back…”
Oh god…
“Stop!” Making her rasp out a throaty laugh as his hand sprung up in front of her face. Imploring silence. “Why did Buff let you out for a shower?”
“Ask B.” The lack of answer simply fuelling his fantasies. Prompting Faith to ease up on him, to cast her eyes down and look for the treasure. To get back to the fun stuff that kept the screaming fury at bay. Everything opposite of Buffy. “Look, don’t sweat it man, she probably thought I was stinking up the place. She was armed, I was terrified the whole time.” Waiting till his gaze unglazed and slid back to soft. “So where’s the treasure then? Gotta give the girl her booty.”
And it had paved the way for the easiness to continue. Him teasing her for what seemed like an eternity with an unmarked carrier bag, a different kind of rage, the one which screamed impatience, finally having him offering up something which meant close to everything to her. The real her. Nothing able to hide the excitement that had exploded in her eyes as they fell on the book in his hands. A reflection of the comics she had once owned herself…
“Holy Fuck… is that, oh my god…”
Her words jumbled and lacking the hardness which often tainted even the softest of her sentences. “You got me Cataclysm!”
Wanting to break through the bars for a different reason, every ounce of her aching to grab Xander and wrap him in an embrace like salvation. To get to that book, to remember everything that wasn’t about being bad, that was all about being good.
“I thought you might remember it.”
“Remember it?! Dude, I read those comics a thousand times. This is so fucking awesome. Pass it here.”
Faith outstretched her hand, passing through the barrier of the bars, touching freedom. Almost touching. Xander whipping the book away at the last minute, something like his own evilness tinting the glint that shone through his eye. “Wait, you have to do something first.”
“You what?”
“Quid pro quo. You give, you get.”
“You want *my* booty first?” And where the hell did that come from? Was he an evil pirate, all about plundering and pillaging the goodies…
“No! I *so* didn’t mean that.”
“Then what do you want?”
Her confusion genuine, no clues gained as the smile stretched his face, as that glint continued to grow. So curious as his hand dipped inside of the bag again, pulling something else out, so sure of himself, so full of the glee.
“What I want Faith, is you to finally admit the truth.”
“The truth?”
“Yep.” His hands turning to show her the cover of the next book. The title which glared bright from the artwork on the front. The Incredible Hulk vs. Superman. He knew she hadn’t ever owned this graphic novel, he remembered it coming out after she was gone. He remembered that slight wish for her to be around at the time, to argue the points with. “Hulk could so beat Superman’s ass.”
He held it just at arms length, just out of reaching distance. His smirk growing as she eyed him with that same old disdain, her smile growing to encompass the whole of the basement. “Not ever gonna happen.”
“No give, no get.”
His grin staying resolute, his arm not giving an inch. Watching as her own resolve crumbled, as her eyes flicked faster and faster to the comic in his hands.
“Okay… sure, fine, whatever. The big bad Hulk could beat Superman’s ass…” Her grin triumphant as he gave the book over, her mouth knowing it was time to trumpet victory. “…on the day that hell freezes over. Green dude’s a chump, bet this book proves it.”
Laughing nothing but the sound of pleasure as he started arguing his four years worth of points that she had missed, as he tried to fill in every blank that had been lost to the girl in a hospital bed. Not coming close to winning, her stubbornness not at all affected by what he said happened in the book. It was something he had anticipated, something he had prepared for. The enticement of No Man’s Land.
This was his coup de grace. The thing that he was sure would have her like putty in his hands. Breaking through any hint of remaining snarl to return to the time before the badness. To hopefully stay there. His hand lifting out the first of the five novels in the series, ignoring all of her Hulk slurs to lose himself in the real treasure. The only booty that he knew she would desire.
“What’s that?”
Enjoying his ignorance, just flitting that eye occasionally up to study her face. Wanting to laugh as the expression only darkened, that familiar badass that was nothing about death and destruction, just part of the package of Faith.
“Don’t fucking ignore me Xander, what have you got?!”
“Say it and mean it, Faith.”
“Screw you.” Her fingers tightening on the bars, her eyes deepening as they fixed on nothing but him. “What is it?”
And he couldn’t keep in his own excitement. Forget who was better between Hulk and Superman, this was about making Faith feel better, about giving her back her own superhero. His voice full of importance as he finally gave into her demands.
“No Man’s Land.”
Not getting it. Her eyes looking unimpressed, her tone about to hit cursory again. It made him show his hand, slide out the ace in the pack; “Batman, Faith. I’ve brought you the all *new* tall, dark and broody. The stuff you missed. The rest of the story.”
There were no screams of girly excitement, nothing that he would have found upstairs with new clothes and matching pants; but there was something which went so very much deeper. Which touched his heart. The way that her shoulders slumped, the way that her eyes widened, the way that they shone.
“You brought me Batman?”
A plea for her hero?
Xander wished that he had the bright lights signal to really call him forth, to have him swoop in and save the damsel in distress, to wipe away all of the darkness that lingered in Faith’s eyes. He stepped the last distance forward and placed it gently in her grasp, his voice taking the monotone to slide her up to date;
“This is what came after Cataclysm. There’s five of them, I got them all. They’re really good, you’re gonna like them.”
“I already love them.” Her eyes drinking up the image on the front, her hero standing tall and proud. A light in the dark. Ready for action. “This is so fucking cool.”
And it was. Even better than the feeling she had found in the shower.
The world that existed between the pages of the book, was not about taking pain and making pain. Her pain didn’t exist there, none of this existed there. No coma, no four years of frustration that she had woken up to embrace so harshly. No death, no hate, no rage and despair. This was a world for superheroes. The kind of world she longed for. Yearned for. Faith may not have known it, would not have accepted it, but beneath those demons, beneath the shell that had been her own lifetime crafting of granite, there was still a superhero aching to break free.
Trapped in a prison stronger than any kryptonite, trapped in a city which offered more destruction than any mythical Gotham. But still there. Still inside. Still her. Fighting battles she didn’t even know existed, buried so deep in the trash and the filth, the death and the darkness that had always been her life. Muted by demon screams, by the unhinged howls which pled for revenge.
Faith forgot those thoughts when her mind found sanctuary in the make believe world of the superheroes. Moments of victory when real demons didn’t exist, where everything was quiet, except for the truth;
Good over evil. The superhero always won.
It didn’t matter how much trash and filth existed on the way, how much darkness reached out to touch even the most super of heroes in moments of weakness - they still always came out on top. Bad guys didn’t win.
There was always someone there to slay the demons.
Her shoulders found more of the weary as she finally dragged herself back through the doors to The Hyperion. Another duty performed, another night spent battling the forces of evil. And she had battled hard tonight. Slaying what had felt like a thousand demons, a whole gang banging group of something she couldn’t pronounce, stepping up to ease her tension. She would never remember their names even if she could get her mouth to pronounce. They didn’t need names. They were demons, she slayed them. It’s what she did.
Buffy’s moves were effortless as she vaulted herself across the counter to land in the chair in front of the screen. A decision made as she had made mince meat - or gloopey mess - out of the unpronounceable demons; to placate the need that her eyes had, to take a look at Faith. An unguarded look. A look which would contemplate everything that had fought to rush fast through her body upstairs in the bathroom.
Desire.
That was what she was calling it. Unwelcome desire? Definitely. Unexpected desire? Not entirely.
She remembered the feeling. She was feeling the feeling. And she knew full well that the feeling had no place being felt in the present situation. Faith had the mind of a seventeen year old psychotic. And that should have been enough to dampen everything that felt like desire.
Words she said to herself as her finger reached out to touch the button, to flick the switch. Bringing to life everything she had been thinking upon, every untarnished memory she had been focusing upon. Buffy wanted to isolate the feeling, to allow it, and then to get a grip on it. Place it back in a prison just as bound and unbreakable as the prison that housed Faith.
She hadn’t known about the coup de grace though, about Xander’s own acts of bonding brought about by untarnished memories. It meant the releasing of different feelings, something which still begged to remain unnamed, that she still didn’t feel mature enough to deal with. Her heart beating fast as her eyes had focused on what was on show;
Faith. Not hunched and sat bewildered in a corner. Not raging fists against the bars that kept her confined. No. Instead she was slouched comfortably on her side, head propped up on an elbow, her eyes intense as they flicked over what was in front of her.
A comic. One in front, and a pile by the bedside.
Buffy’s hand shook with the unknown as she traced out the image that shone before her, as her mind carried her thoughts to all those places called Heaven. Remembering only that feeling, only the peace and tranquillity, the sense of everything being okay. She wanted to rise and take the stairs, she wanted to see with her own eyes, to engage this Faith who looked like the one she often imagined.
She wouldn’t rise though. She couldn’t rise. She refused to. She had not even come close to getting a grip on that thing called desire, and now, unknowingly thanks to a man named Xander, she had so much else to get a grip upon.
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