Redemptions
DisguisedDiva
Disclaimer: Not mine, don't own 'em.
Distribution: E-mail me.
Rating: PG13 and barely that.
Author's Notes/Spoilers: Nothing much, somehow Faith's outta jail and working for Angel, and I kinda... adjusted Buffy's pre-Sunnydale history. But Joss's way, she and Pike were in L.A., so I'm just putting in events that didn't really happen, exactly. The ending sucks, but w/e.
Summary: Buffy and Faith have more in common than they thought.
Story:
Prologue
Vegas, July, 1995
Buffy Summers walked through the dark alley. It was well past midnight and any normal girl would be in bed, or at a rave or something like that. Not walking through a dirty, gross alley. But Buffy wasn't normal. She was the Slayer. The one girl in all the world who could fight against the forces of darkness, and demons and other gross things out to destroy life as she and her fellow humans knew it.
This is so rediculous. I should be with my 'friends' in L.A. I should still be ruling the school, I should not be expelled. I should not be in Vegas with Pike.
Pike. Her boyfriend. The one guy in all the world that could put up with all her crap. A total scrub. And God help her she was falling for him.
Suddenly she felt a hand on her hip and her not-so-happy thoughts were replaced by those of battle techniques, and where she could find a stake around here. "Alley's not the safest place at night, little girl."
Buffy spun, launching a high kick to his neck. It would have barely phazed a vampire, but Buffy realized all too late that the man behind her was not a vampire. A deafening crack sounded as the body slumped to the ground. "Oh God," she whispered brokenly. "Oh my god!" Then she did all she could do. She ran all the way to the hotel she and Pike were staying in without looking back.
~*~*~*~Later That Night~*~*~*~
"You killed someone?" Pike looked, shocked, at what his girlfriend had told him. "Like a living, breathing, human someone?"
"He's not breathing anymore," Buffy replied casually.
"Well are you gonna go to the cops?" he asked quietly, making it very clear through his tone that he thought she should.
"And say what?" Buffy asked sarchastically. "'Hi, this guy came up to me, and I thought he was a vampire so I snapped his neck?' I can see that going over well."
"You have to do something!" he shouted, exasperated.
"No Pike, I don't! The guy was in the worst neighborhood in Vegas! No one blinks at dead bodies around there!" the Slayer's voice was rising, and he noticed an all to familiar tint in her eyes. A dangerous tint.
"Buffy you killed someone!" he tried again to reach her.
"So?"
"So?! SO?! Just because you're super-girl you get a get out of jail free pass?! You committed murder!" he screamed. "You have to accept the consequences, accident or not."
"I can't go to jail. I'm the Slayer. The One girl. The Chosen One. Until I die, no one else picks up the slack," she told him in what he'd come to think of as her cheerleader voice. The voice that constantly reminded him that the annoying self-centered girl was indeed still a very big part of her, no matter how much she'd changed. She still thought the world revolved around her. She constantly blamed herself for everyone she couldn't have saved, and at the same time felt all the rules didn't apply to her. She was special. "This is my life Pike. Forever. The normal rules can't apply. It's up to me."
"I can't believe I thought you could ever be more than a self-centered prom queen," he snapped, letting out all his frustration of the past few weeks, in which they'd spent way too much time together. "All you've ever thought of was yourself, wasn't it? You don't care about the world, you don't care that Merrik died for you, you don't care about any of it! You can't be popular anymore, so you do whatever you can to get a little simpathy. Well don't expect it from me!" Before he knew what was happening, the bottle Buffy held had broken on the side of his face, and blood trickled down his left cheek. Buffy looked as shocked as he felt.
"Oh God, Pike!" she gasped, staring at the wound she'd inflicted. She reached up to touch it, but he slapped her hand away. "Pike let me help!"
"No," he snapped, grabbing his keys.
"Let me at least ride with you to the hospital!" she called after him. The door slammed in responce.
He hated her. Hated what she was, who she'd been and who she'd become. Hated that he loved her anyway.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Buffy followed on foot, too worried for him to sit and wait. God, why did I do that? I had no right to hit him at all... I'm the SLAYER!! What was I thinking? I'm supposed to protect the innocent, not kill them! No, he shouldn't have mentioned Merrik. He knows I hate that. But I shouldn't have hit him! I've lost everything, and now I'm just gonna throw him away too?
He saw her the minute he walked out, and they both knew it, but he kept going anyway. She called after him, begging him, tears streaming down her face as she called to him, but he didn't answer. He didn't even turn. So she broken-heartedly began her walk 'home,' her head bowed, tears falling.
Another guy came up to her, and twisted her arm backwards. "Be good and maybe you'll live," he snarled. She spun around launching a lethal blow to his head. Once again believing he would live, believing him to be a vampire. Once again he wasn't. He slammed backwards into a wall, and Buffy turned and ran to the hospital for help. The EMT's pronounced him dead. Buffy had killed two men in one night.
As the sun came up, Buffy slipped into the hotel room. Pike was up and packing. "You're... you're leaving?" God he couldn't leave now. He had to be there for her now. She needed him.
"He was a cop Buffy. The guy you killed last night? He was a cop. He was probably trying to protect you," Pike told her.
"No... no way... that's not possible... he was..." she trailed off, staring at the front page of the newspaper on the bed. 'Cop Killer On The Lose' it read, and the picture showed the man he killed. "He... he was going to..."
"To what Buffy? Kill you?" Pike snapped. "You know that's not true!"
"I didn't say that! God! But... he... he had his hands on my hip... I... no..." she picked up the paper and skimmed it. Apparently he was not only a cop, but he was THE cop. And he'd left behind a family, 3 kids, a wife, and a mother, all living with him. "No..."
"You killed a cop," Pike repeated. "And if you turn yourself in now, I'll stay. I'll help you. But if you keep running from it... I have to go."
"Pike... I can't! I... what if I turn myself in, and even if I do eventually get off, the apocalypse happens before I can!" Buffy asked. Her heart had broken in a million pieces, and was lying on the floor between them.
"Then I'll give you a ride to L.A. After that... after last night... I think it's best that we not see each other at all after you get home..." she was sobbing now, and it tore his own heart apart. But he couldn't be with a murderer.
"Please Pike! God, I'll do anything else... but... even if there was no apocalypse, do you know what the Council would do to me?" she cried to him. He wanted to take her in his arms and calm her down, but it would start all over again.
"God Buffy, I don't want to go... I just... I can't be with you," her boyfriend told her.
"You called me selfish?" she wailed. "Do you know how guilty I feel? Do you know how much I need you right now? Please Pike! I can't do this alone..."
"You wouldn't be alone if you did the right thing. Someone told me, the bad guys always end up by themselves," he said coldly. "And you're chosing the wrong way out. The easy way."
"The easy way? Oh yeah, this is the easiest thing I've ever done! I get to go nearly get killed every night. I get to be sick with guilt. I get to lose the guy I think I'm falling in love with! I get to have no friends! I get to lead a crappy half life in some perfect town with my mom while my dad keeps screwing the freaking secretary!" she screamed. "And you know what? I just realized that you don't give a damn!"
"That's not true," he said quietly.
"Screw the ride," she spat. "I'll find a bus."
"Bye Buffy," he said sadly.
"Go to Hell," she shot, and with that, they both left Vegas and their relationship behind.
Part One
Faith was out of jail. And in Angel's building. Living with Angel. Working with Angel. "What the hell is she doing here?" Buffy snapped.
"Buffy, please, let's not get into this again," Angel practically begged. She'd only come back to life from... wherever she was, she'd never really said, a few months ago and they were fighting. Typical. "She needed a job."
"What? She couldn't just steal the money?"
"She's trying, harder than you've ever tried anything."
"How would you know," a cold laugh came from the woman he loved. "How would you know any God-damned thing about me? I'm not a part of your little club or whatever it is with Faith. I'm not a part of your life. You don't even know me."
"No I sure as hell don't!" Angel shouted. "Because you're not the girl I fell in love with."
"Gee, I'm sorry. Maybe I'fe had some hard things to deal with. Maybe you left Sunnydale, insisting you would still be there for me and tore my heart right out of my body! Maybe you broke your promise. You weren't there when I needed you. You were never there when I needed you. But Faith you're there for!" Buffy screamed.
"Um, hi, is this Angel Investigations?" a third voice came from the doorway. Angel nodded.
Both Buffy and the guest gasped when they saw each other. "Pike?" she whispered.
"Buffy," he said quielty. "I, uh, heard you died."
"I did," Buffy shrugged. Angel looked between them. She'd told him about Pike. He was the guy before him. The guy from Hemry.
"Can I help you?" Angel asked, struggling to sound polite.
"Uh, yeah. I got bit by a.... a..., well it was a something. I never could get the species down right. And this happened," he pulled up his sleeve to reveal a red, scaley section of skin. Buffy, Angel noticed, had barely glanced at it. She was staring sadly at a scar on the side of his face. He wondered briefly if he'd gotten it while they were together. The vampire pushed the thought aside. Jealousy was pointless.
"I'll get my associate... he's better at that kind of thing," Angel muttered, going off to find Wesley. Buffy continued staring.
"You, uh, you look good," Pike said quietly.
"You too, minus the scales," her eyes still didn't waver from the scar.
"It's okay, Buffy," he told her. "I'm over it, really."
"I am sorry," she told him. "For... everything. I... it wasn't supposed to end that way."
"No, it wasn't," he agreed. "But you kinda can't plan that stuff."
"I guess not," she said forlornly. "So, uh, how've you been?"
"Good, good, and you?"
"Well, I haven't killed anyone since..."
"Pike," Angel announced his return. "This is Wesley. Wesley, Pike."
"Hey," Pike said. Buffy stared between Pike and Angel, mentally comparing them, knowing Angel would win, but also knowing that Pike stood a better chance than Riley had. Pike she had actually loved once.
Part Two
Buffy sat in the room she'd occupied for the sixteen years before her parents split. Struggling to breath, she felt the tears start to fall. Why am I always such a bitch about her? she berrated herself. She's trying really hard. And you told her she could trust you remember? That she wasn't alone? And now you're treating her like trash? Who are you?
'I can't believe I ever thought you could be more than a self-centered prom queen. All you've ever thought about was yourself...'
'You don't care that Merrik died for you...'
Was she really that girl? Was she really still the insipid head-cheerleader of Hemry High? The girl who'd rather paint her nails than save the world? The girl who killed two at least almost innocent men without caring and broke a bottle on her boyfriends face?
"No, she whispered. She had cared. She'd felt incredibly guilty over the whole thing. She'd needed Pike to understand her the way Angel understood Faith. Instead he'd left. And then Angel had. And Buffy was alone. Bufy would always be alone.
'The bad guys always end up by themselves.'
~*~*~*~
"So... you dated B?" Faith asked the relatively handsome new client.
"Buffy? Yeah," Pike nodded. "We dated."
"She hates me."
Pike stared at the famed 'Rogue Slayer.' "Buffy doesn't 'hate,' " he told her. The dark-haired woman shook her head.
"She hates me. And she had every right to. I've... I've done a lot. But I'm trying so hard to fix it," she replied.
Memories flashed through Pike's head of the night they split, and the times he'd seen her in L.A. afterwards. Things had only gotten worse for her. But he'd seen the fierce determination in her eyes earlier. The look that told him she was struggling just as hard as the other girl. She'd struggled for longer. Knowing Buffy she'd struggle forever.
"This should do it," another woman came up to him. "My name's Fred. Here's your antidote."
Pike smiled greatfully and took it. His scales disappeared quickly. Thank God, he thought.
That's when the third woman fell, holding her head. "What is it?" the British guy asked gently. "What do you see?"
"It's Buffy... near her dad's... there's not enough time. God, there's not enough time," she told them. The whole scene confused him, but Pike knew the way, so he led it.
~*~*~*~
The road to the bust station was dark and dangerous, but Buffy had to get back to Sunnydale. Hell, she'd go back to Vegas to get away from Angel's anger.
Angel's anger. Her Angel. Angry at her. Hating her. How could he hate her? He didn't even know the reason he should. She'd never told him what happened. He would have left, like Pike. In the end it hadn't mattered. He left anyway.
Buffy was so wrapped up in her own thoughts she didn't notice the vampires until much too late. There were so many. Too many. She couldn't fight them all. So she closed her eyes. She deserved it anyway. Part Three
There hadn't been time to get ready for battle. After screaming for Angel, Faith, and Pike had taken off in a run, not waiting to pick Gunn up, not thinking of anything but the tiny blond slayer who was fighting for her life. And Cordelia was right. There hadn't been enough time.
She wasn't even fighting as they beat her. They maimed and tortured her and she just closed her eyes. And it wasn't until one went in for the kill that her saviors reacted, Angel and Pike fighting the others as Faith dusted the one draining Buffy.
Holding the bleeding Slayer carefully, Faith hurried her to the hospital. "Faith," her voice was sore, hoarse, and broken. "Faith, you saved me... you saved my life."
"Eye for an eye," Faith muttered, offering a wry grin. "Don't expect me to go away just 'cause you were a bitch."
Buffy winced. "I deserved that," she admitted. Then the world went black.
~*~*~*~
When Buffy came to she was lying in a hospital bed with a crying Angel by her side. Angel crying? What was up with that? "Hey," she whispered, because it was all she could do.
His head shot up. "I thought you were going to... they said you might not wake up."
"I did," her voice was as calm and reassuring as she could get it. "Can you get Faith and Pike? I need to explain something."
"Buffy, is now really the time?"
"Yes," she said firmly. "Don't worry... I'm not going to attack her. Not after tonight."
"Actually, it was a couple weeks ago," he said quietly. "Dawn and Giles came down. So did Willow and Xander and... his girlfriend."
Taking that in, Buffy nodded. "Tell them I want to see them but... I've put this off too long."
Angel nodded and was back a few minutes later, Faith and Pike confused but in tow. Buffy took a deep breath. "Faith did I ever tell you what happened in Vegas?"
"Your first Watcher died, you burned down the school, got kicked out and bailed?"
"Not why I went, what happened while I was there," Buffy told her. "I, um, I was out patrolling one night, and heading back to the hotel Pike and I were staying in..."
"Together?" Faith asked slyly, raising one eyebrow. Buffy rolled her eyes, but managed a weak smile.
"Nothing happened," she told her, and then continued. "It was really late, I was still on a high from a big fight, and I wasn't exactly paying attention..."
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Pike cut in. Buffy nodded. "And why am I here?"
"A. moral support, B. I never told you the whole story. Anyway a guy came up behind me and warned me about Vegas alleys. Before I could even think my reflexes kicked in. I spun around, and kicked him in the neck, hard. I..." she closed her eyes and slowly opened them again.. "I snapped it."
She heard the gasp, but continued anyway. "When I got back to the hotel, Pike and I got into a fight. He wanted me to go to the cops."
"But you couldn't," Faith interrupted. "The Master would have ended the world by now."
"That's basically what I said, minus the Master part. He said some thing about Merrik, and I flipped. I, uh, I broke a bottle on the side of his head," she said, quietly pointing to the scar. "I did that. It wasn't too deep, and he was able to drive to the hospital on his own. I walked by myself, but he didn't want anything to do with me, so I had to walk back to the hotel too."
"I was really upset, and another guy came up to me, threatening to kill me, and I hit him, hard in the face. He slammed into a wall. I ran back to the hospital, but the EMT's said he was already dead. When I got back to the hotel Pike was packed. According to the newspaper, the first guy I'd killed was a cop... a really good cop too... After that, things went downhill. I was pretty messed up, who wouldn't be?"
"When I got to Sunnydale, I decided to make a new name for myself, but I never really forgave myself for Vegas. So when... I've been punishing you for what I did," Buffy told Faith. Angel sat staring at her.
"Why didn't you tell me?" he asked quietly.
"I thought you'd hate me," she admitted. "I didn't want to lose you."
Angel brushed her hair from her face and whispered so only she could hear "you'll never lose me." Faith and Pike slipped out.
"I love you," Buffy whispered.
"I love you," he said. "And I have something to tell you, too. Someday... I'm going to become human. I didn't want to tell you, because I didn't want to ruin your life... but I... I almost lost you tonight. And I just... wait for me?"
"I may not have known what would happen, but I was already waiting," she told him quietly. They smiled at each other. They each had their own paths, their own redemptions. But they'd make it. Together. After all, together they were strong. Alone they were dead.
Epilogue
Angel turned human a year later, and he and Buffy moved back and forth between L.A. and Sunnydale very often. When their first child was born, they decided to settle in Sunnydale, but kept their L.A. home, and returned to it frequently. After 3 children, and 10 happy years together, Buffy was killed averting yet another apocalypse. Angel was devestated, and year later, Angel was killed by a vampire. After making sure Angelus didn't come back, Faith and Pike took the children under their wings.
Disclaimer: Not mine, don't own 'em.
Distribution: E-mail me.
Rating: PG13 and barely that.
Author's Notes/Spoilers: Nothing much, somehow Faith's outta jail and working for Angel, and I kinda... adjusted Buffy's pre-Sunnydale history. But Joss's way, she and Pike were in L.A., so I'm just putting in events that didn't really happen, exactly. The ending sucks, but w/e.
Summary: Buffy and Faith have more in common than they thought.
Story:
Prologue
Vegas, July, 1995
Buffy Summers walked through the dark alley. It was well past midnight and any normal girl would be in bed, or at a rave or something like that. Not walking through a dirty, gross alley. But Buffy wasn't normal. She was the Slayer. The one girl in all the world who could fight against the forces of darkness, and demons and other gross things out to destroy life as she and her fellow humans knew it.
This is so rediculous. I should be with my 'friends' in L.A. I should still be ruling the school, I should not be expelled. I should not be in Vegas with Pike.
Pike. Her boyfriend. The one guy in all the world that could put up with all her crap. A total scrub. And God help her she was falling for him.
Suddenly she felt a hand on her hip and her not-so-happy thoughts were replaced by those of battle techniques, and where she could find a stake around here. "Alley's not the safest place at night, little girl."
Buffy spun, launching a high kick to his neck. It would have barely phazed a vampire, but Buffy realized all too late that the man behind her was not a vampire. A deafening crack sounded as the body slumped to the ground. "Oh God," she whispered brokenly. "Oh my god!" Then she did all she could do. She ran all the way to the hotel she and Pike were staying in without looking back.
~*~*~*~Later That Night~*~*~*~
"You killed someone?" Pike looked, shocked, at what his girlfriend had told him. "Like a living, breathing, human someone?"
"He's not breathing anymore," Buffy replied casually.
"Well are you gonna go to the cops?" he asked quietly, making it very clear through his tone that he thought she should.
"And say what?" Buffy asked sarchastically. "'Hi, this guy came up to me, and I thought he was a vampire so I snapped his neck?' I can see that going over well."
"You have to do something!" he shouted, exasperated.
"No Pike, I don't! The guy was in the worst neighborhood in Vegas! No one blinks at dead bodies around there!" the Slayer's voice was rising, and he noticed an all to familiar tint in her eyes. A dangerous tint.
"Buffy you killed someone!" he tried again to reach her.
"So?"
"So?! SO?! Just because you're super-girl you get a get out of jail free pass?! You committed murder!" he screamed. "You have to accept the consequences, accident or not."
"I can't go to jail. I'm the Slayer. The One girl. The Chosen One. Until I die, no one else picks up the slack," she told him in what he'd come to think of as her cheerleader voice. The voice that constantly reminded him that the annoying self-centered girl was indeed still a very big part of her, no matter how much she'd changed. She still thought the world revolved around her. She constantly blamed herself for everyone she couldn't have saved, and at the same time felt all the rules didn't apply to her. She was special. "This is my life Pike. Forever. The normal rules can't apply. It's up to me."
"I can't believe I thought you could ever be more than a self-centered prom queen," he snapped, letting out all his frustration of the past few weeks, in which they'd spent way too much time together. "All you've ever thought of was yourself, wasn't it? You don't care about the world, you don't care that Merrik died for you, you don't care about any of it! You can't be popular anymore, so you do whatever you can to get a little simpathy. Well don't expect it from me!" Before he knew what was happening, the bottle Buffy held had broken on the side of his face, and blood trickled down his left cheek. Buffy looked as shocked as he felt.
"Oh God, Pike!" she gasped, staring at the wound she'd inflicted. She reached up to touch it, but he slapped her hand away. "Pike let me help!"
"No," he snapped, grabbing his keys.
"Let me at least ride with you to the hospital!" she called after him. The door slammed in responce.
He hated her. Hated what she was, who she'd been and who she'd become. Hated that he loved her anyway.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Buffy followed on foot, too worried for him to sit and wait. God, why did I do that? I had no right to hit him at all... I'm the SLAYER!! What was I thinking? I'm supposed to protect the innocent, not kill them! No, he shouldn't have mentioned Merrik. He knows I hate that. But I shouldn't have hit him! I've lost everything, and now I'm just gonna throw him away too?
He saw her the minute he walked out, and they both knew it, but he kept going anyway. She called after him, begging him, tears streaming down her face as she called to him, but he didn't answer. He didn't even turn. So she broken-heartedly began her walk 'home,' her head bowed, tears falling.
Another guy came up to her, and twisted her arm backwards. "Be good and maybe you'll live," he snarled. She spun around launching a lethal blow to his head. Once again believing he would live, believing him to be a vampire. Once again he wasn't. He slammed backwards into a wall, and Buffy turned and ran to the hospital for help. The EMT's pronounced him dead. Buffy had killed two men in one night.
As the sun came up, Buffy slipped into the hotel room. Pike was up and packing. "You're... you're leaving?" God he couldn't leave now. He had to be there for her now. She needed him.
"He was a cop Buffy. The guy you killed last night? He was a cop. He was probably trying to protect you," Pike told her.
"No... no way... that's not possible... he was..." she trailed off, staring at the front page of the newspaper on the bed. 'Cop Killer On The Lose' it read, and the picture showed the man he killed. "He... he was going to..."
"To what Buffy? Kill you?" Pike snapped. "You know that's not true!"
"I didn't say that! God! But... he... he had his hands on my hip... I... no..." she picked up the paper and skimmed it. Apparently he was not only a cop, but he was THE cop. And he'd left behind a family, 3 kids, a wife, and a mother, all living with him. "No..."
"You killed a cop," Pike repeated. "And if you turn yourself in now, I'll stay. I'll help you. But if you keep running from it... I have to go."
"Pike... I can't! I... what if I turn myself in, and even if I do eventually get off, the apocalypse happens before I can!" Buffy asked. Her heart had broken in a million pieces, and was lying on the floor between them.
"Then I'll give you a ride to L.A. After that... after last night... I think it's best that we not see each other at all after you get home..." she was sobbing now, and it tore his own heart apart. But he couldn't be with a murderer.
"Please Pike! God, I'll do anything else... but... even if there was no apocalypse, do you know what the Council would do to me?" she cried to him. He wanted to take her in his arms and calm her down, but it would start all over again.
"God Buffy, I don't want to go... I just... I can't be with you," her boyfriend told her.
"You called me selfish?" she wailed. "Do you know how guilty I feel? Do you know how much I need you right now? Please Pike! I can't do this alone..."
"You wouldn't be alone if you did the right thing. Someone told me, the bad guys always end up by themselves," he said coldly. "And you're chosing the wrong way out. The easy way."
"The easy way? Oh yeah, this is the easiest thing I've ever done! I get to go nearly get killed every night. I get to be sick with guilt. I get to lose the guy I think I'm falling in love with! I get to have no friends! I get to lead a crappy half life in some perfect town with my mom while my dad keeps screwing the freaking secretary!" she screamed. "And you know what? I just realized that you don't give a damn!"
"That's not true," he said quietly.
"Screw the ride," she spat. "I'll find a bus."
"Bye Buffy," he said sadly.
"Go to Hell," she shot, and with that, they both left Vegas and their relationship behind.
Part One
Faith was out of jail. And in Angel's building. Living with Angel. Working with Angel. "What the hell is she doing here?" Buffy snapped.
"Buffy, please, let's not get into this again," Angel practically begged. She'd only come back to life from... wherever she was, she'd never really said, a few months ago and they were fighting. Typical. "She needed a job."
"What? She couldn't just steal the money?"
"She's trying, harder than you've ever tried anything."
"How would you know," a cold laugh came from the woman he loved. "How would you know any God-damned thing about me? I'm not a part of your little club or whatever it is with Faith. I'm not a part of your life. You don't even know me."
"No I sure as hell don't!" Angel shouted. "Because you're not the girl I fell in love with."
"Gee, I'm sorry. Maybe I'fe had some hard things to deal with. Maybe you left Sunnydale, insisting you would still be there for me and tore my heart right out of my body! Maybe you broke your promise. You weren't there when I needed you. You were never there when I needed you. But Faith you're there for!" Buffy screamed.
"Um, hi, is this Angel Investigations?" a third voice came from the doorway. Angel nodded.
Both Buffy and the guest gasped when they saw each other. "Pike?" she whispered.
"Buffy," he said quielty. "I, uh, heard you died."
"I did," Buffy shrugged. Angel looked between them. She'd told him about Pike. He was the guy before him. The guy from Hemry.
"Can I help you?" Angel asked, struggling to sound polite.
"Uh, yeah. I got bit by a.... a..., well it was a something. I never could get the species down right. And this happened," he pulled up his sleeve to reveal a red, scaley section of skin. Buffy, Angel noticed, had barely glanced at it. She was staring sadly at a scar on the side of his face. He wondered briefly if he'd gotten it while they were together. The vampire pushed the thought aside. Jealousy was pointless.
"I'll get my associate... he's better at that kind of thing," Angel muttered, going off to find Wesley. Buffy continued staring.
"You, uh, you look good," Pike said quietly.
"You too, minus the scales," her eyes still didn't waver from the scar.
"It's okay, Buffy," he told her. "I'm over it, really."
"I am sorry," she told him. "For... everything. I... it wasn't supposed to end that way."
"No, it wasn't," he agreed. "But you kinda can't plan that stuff."
"I guess not," she said forlornly. "So, uh, how've you been?"
"Good, good, and you?"
"Well, I haven't killed anyone since..."
"Pike," Angel announced his return. "This is Wesley. Wesley, Pike."
"Hey," Pike said. Buffy stared between Pike and Angel, mentally comparing them, knowing Angel would win, but also knowing that Pike stood a better chance than Riley had. Pike she had actually loved once.
Part Two
Buffy sat in the room she'd occupied for the sixteen years before her parents split. Struggling to breath, she felt the tears start to fall. Why am I always such a bitch about her? she berrated herself. She's trying really hard. And you told her she could trust you remember? That she wasn't alone? And now you're treating her like trash? Who are you?
'I can't believe I ever thought you could be more than a self-centered prom queen. All you've ever thought about was yourself...'
'You don't care that Merrik died for you...'
Was she really that girl? Was she really still the insipid head-cheerleader of Hemry High? The girl who'd rather paint her nails than save the world? The girl who killed two at least almost innocent men without caring and broke a bottle on her boyfriends face?
"No, she whispered. She had cared. She'd felt incredibly guilty over the whole thing. She'd needed Pike to understand her the way Angel understood Faith. Instead he'd left. And then Angel had. And Buffy was alone. Bufy would always be alone.
'The bad guys always end up by themselves.'
~*~*~*~
"So... you dated B?" Faith asked the relatively handsome new client.
"Buffy? Yeah," Pike nodded. "We dated."
"She hates me."
Pike stared at the famed 'Rogue Slayer.' "Buffy doesn't 'hate,' " he told her. The dark-haired woman shook her head.
"She hates me. And she had every right to. I've... I've done a lot. But I'm trying so hard to fix it," she replied.
Memories flashed through Pike's head of the night they split, and the times he'd seen her in L.A. afterwards. Things had only gotten worse for her. But he'd seen the fierce determination in her eyes earlier. The look that told him she was struggling just as hard as the other girl. She'd struggled for longer. Knowing Buffy she'd struggle forever.
"This should do it," another woman came up to him. "My name's Fred. Here's your antidote."
Pike smiled greatfully and took it. His scales disappeared quickly. Thank God, he thought.
That's when the third woman fell, holding her head. "What is it?" the British guy asked gently. "What do you see?"
"It's Buffy... near her dad's... there's not enough time. God, there's not enough time," she told them. The whole scene confused him, but Pike knew the way, so he led it.
~*~*~*~
The road to the bust station was dark and dangerous, but Buffy had to get back to Sunnydale. Hell, she'd go back to Vegas to get away from Angel's anger.
Angel's anger. Her Angel. Angry at her. Hating her. How could he hate her? He didn't even know the reason he should. She'd never told him what happened. He would have left, like Pike. In the end it hadn't mattered. He left anyway.
Buffy was so wrapped up in her own thoughts she didn't notice the vampires until much too late. There were so many. Too many. She couldn't fight them all. So she closed her eyes. She deserved it anyway. Part Three
There hadn't been time to get ready for battle. After screaming for Angel, Faith, and Pike had taken off in a run, not waiting to pick Gunn up, not thinking of anything but the tiny blond slayer who was fighting for her life. And Cordelia was right. There hadn't been enough time.
She wasn't even fighting as they beat her. They maimed and tortured her and she just closed her eyes. And it wasn't until one went in for the kill that her saviors reacted, Angel and Pike fighting the others as Faith dusted the one draining Buffy.
Holding the bleeding Slayer carefully, Faith hurried her to the hospital. "Faith," her voice was sore, hoarse, and broken. "Faith, you saved me... you saved my life."
"Eye for an eye," Faith muttered, offering a wry grin. "Don't expect me to go away just 'cause you were a bitch."
Buffy winced. "I deserved that," she admitted. Then the world went black.
~*~*~*~
When Buffy came to she was lying in a hospital bed with a crying Angel by her side. Angel crying? What was up with that? "Hey," she whispered, because it was all she could do.
His head shot up. "I thought you were going to... they said you might not wake up."
"I did," her voice was as calm and reassuring as she could get it. "Can you get Faith and Pike? I need to explain something."
"Buffy, is now really the time?"
"Yes," she said firmly. "Don't worry... I'm not going to attack her. Not after tonight."
"Actually, it was a couple weeks ago," he said quietly. "Dawn and Giles came down. So did Willow and Xander and... his girlfriend."
Taking that in, Buffy nodded. "Tell them I want to see them but... I've put this off too long."
Angel nodded and was back a few minutes later, Faith and Pike confused but in tow. Buffy took a deep breath. "Faith did I ever tell you what happened in Vegas?"
"Your first Watcher died, you burned down the school, got kicked out and bailed?"
"Not why I went, what happened while I was there," Buffy told her. "I, um, I was out patrolling one night, and heading back to the hotel Pike and I were staying in..."
"Together?" Faith asked slyly, raising one eyebrow. Buffy rolled her eyes, but managed a weak smile.
"Nothing happened," she told her, and then continued. "It was really late, I was still on a high from a big fight, and I wasn't exactly paying attention..."
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Pike cut in. Buffy nodded. "And why am I here?"
"A. moral support, B. I never told you the whole story. Anyway a guy came up behind me and warned me about Vegas alleys. Before I could even think my reflexes kicked in. I spun around, and kicked him in the neck, hard. I..." she closed her eyes and slowly opened them again.. "I snapped it."
She heard the gasp, but continued anyway. "When I got back to the hotel, Pike and I got into a fight. He wanted me to go to the cops."
"But you couldn't," Faith interrupted. "The Master would have ended the world by now."
"That's basically what I said, minus the Master part. He said some thing about Merrik, and I flipped. I, uh, I broke a bottle on the side of his head," she said, quietly pointing to the scar. "I did that. It wasn't too deep, and he was able to drive to the hospital on his own. I walked by myself, but he didn't want anything to do with me, so I had to walk back to the hotel too."
"I was really upset, and another guy came up to me, threatening to kill me, and I hit him, hard in the face. He slammed into a wall. I ran back to the hospital, but the EMT's said he was already dead. When I got back to the hotel Pike was packed. According to the newspaper, the first guy I'd killed was a cop... a really good cop too... After that, things went downhill. I was pretty messed up, who wouldn't be?"
"When I got to Sunnydale, I decided to make a new name for myself, but I never really forgave myself for Vegas. So when... I've been punishing you for what I did," Buffy told Faith. Angel sat staring at her.
"Why didn't you tell me?" he asked quietly.
"I thought you'd hate me," she admitted. "I didn't want to lose you."
Angel brushed her hair from her face and whispered so only she could hear "you'll never lose me." Faith and Pike slipped out.
"I love you," Buffy whispered.
"I love you," he said. "And I have something to tell you, too. Someday... I'm going to become human. I didn't want to tell you, because I didn't want to ruin your life... but I... I almost lost you tonight. And I just... wait for me?"
"I may not have known what would happen, but I was already waiting," she told him quietly. They smiled at each other. They each had their own paths, their own redemptions. But they'd make it. Together. After all, together they were strong. Alone they were dead.
Epilogue
Angel turned human a year later, and he and Buffy moved back and forth between L.A. and Sunnydale very often. When their first child was born, they decided to settle in Sunnydale, but kept their L.A. home, and returned to it frequently. After 3 children, and 10 happy years together, Buffy was killed averting yet another apocalypse. Angel was devestated, and year later, Angel was killed by a vampire. After making sure Angelus didn't come back, Faith and Pike took the children under their wings.