Prologue
They had asked her, a long time ago: what was fear?
She didn't know.
She moves in front of her potential, letting the blow glance against her skin. Her skin burns where the demon touches, and it should hurt, but strangely enough it doesn't. Adrenaline, she thinks to herself, taking a moment to regroup. The demon raises it arms again, but this time her sword is well in hand to meet the blow.
Her potential whimpers. She is a strong one, Buffy knows, but there was no coming back from what the demon had broken in her. Her nostrils flare as she inhales the potent scent of potential blood.
The demon fights desperately, and its acid like skin flakes off and is flung at her, like little burning raindrops, and the pain flares briefly where they touch – on her face, her bare arms, her mouth— and leaves a dull ache in its wake. This is really the most disgusting attack she'd ever seen.
Her sword darkens from the edges and becomes like charcoal. The potential is trying to stem her cries, tearing her clothes into little strips to bandage the worst of the cuts. But the dirt, and the dust, and the filth and the grime of this place have already infested them, and the potential knows it. Buffy tries not to stare, for now.
Eventually it dies. She pushes her hand into it and tears out its heart and wraps it in a pure white cloth, before making her way to the potential.
"Kendra," she softly says, sighing. Then she sits beside her, letting the girl scream into her neck while she runs her splayed fingers through her hair. She whispers little nothings into the air.
Kendra's clothes are in tatters, and the dying heat of her body is pressed up against her own, skin scraping over skin as the girl shakes. The slayer within her is right at the surface, uncoiling beneath the skin, luxuriating at the echo, however dim, of itself. And still she speaks, but her voice seems to have a purpose now, but Kendra has long stopped listening.
Buffy is warm, warm and alive, and even though she's dying, Kendra's hands are above Buffy's heart and she marvels again at the contrast. She has lost too much blood, she knows, and her movements oscillate between sluggish and twitches, but the pain has receded for now as another, something more primal to the slayer, to her, has come to the fore. The body beneath her is familiar to her, but not enough that she doesn't feel the ache of regret. And memories well up with the pain.
It has been just two month since she first saw her, and god, how much time they had wasted. It has been less than two weeks since Buffy first approached her in their room, moving her nervous, naked, perfect body against her own petrified frame. And oh, how cautious she had been; how she'd touched that body, fascinated by the contrast, scared of how delicate it all seemed. She remembers every moment, for it is as if they have crystalized now, forever preserved.
The dull, throbbing rush of blood fills her ear, and she is peripherally aware that Buffy is still speaking. Kendra smiles at that, and remembers the half english gibberish Buffy had sprouted at her when she'd first caught her skate a vamp.
But death crowds, and is insistent. And those words fade, and the more pleasurable sounds fill her mind. She remembers how meek and scared Buffy sounds, how restrained for the slayer she seems! The little gasps that she utters, how she quietens her moans. Kendra remembers. Her own self, so much louder, so much –
As if you are trying to fit all those years of restrained passion into just one moment. It's… extraordinary.
Buffy loves her. She knows. She wishes she could open her eyes and kiss her once more. But she can't, so she just presses her lips against her breast.
And then she dies. She's quiet in death, Buffy thinks. And the slayer within her recoils in horror, unable to understand.
She leans back against the wall, and lets out a deep breath. Her last words coincided with the last beat of Kendra's heart, she knows. And she is already feeling stronger. It would, she realizes, take some time to assimilate.
She stands, bends, and looms over Kendra's body, straightening her and closing her eyes. It seems that is the least she can do. Her eyes rove over the cabin. It is all wood, and would be easy enough to burn. It might even make a pretty flame.
It was time to go. Their watchers would be searching for them and she really didn't want to handle the inconvenience of killing some old British men.
Her wounds, she sees, have already healed, so much faster than before. And the strength that infuses her is both familiar and exuberantly new.
She picks up her sword, and her demon heart. She smiles as her bloody fingers leave no mark upon the pristine white.
Suddenly she turns back. The kiss is cold and bloodied, and Kendra's teeth dig roughly into her skin, but she feels that she needs it, and her needs are something she always fulfils. She looms over her dead lover, and for a moment, just for a moment, everything else is insubstantial instead.
Then she turns. She has places to be, she reprimands herself, and flight to catch. To Boston, and a potential called Faith. She repeats the name. It weights heavy with power and promises.
As she leaves she whispers the words. The fire first sparks near Kendra, but spreads with preternatural speed, and her hands are burned where she was gripping the doorway.
She looks at her charred fingers slowly turning pink and wishes she could feel regret.