It was Halloween evening and the Scoobies were all plastered. Well, all the Scoobies except for Faith, who was completely and happily sober. She watched with amusement as drunken chaos unfolded around her. Xander was passed out on the couch, his one-size too small Spiderman costume looking very out of place on a man smelling of beer and cradling an empty 6-pack crate as if it was his favorite stuffed animal. Buffy was in front of the TV screaming the words to "Wannabe" by the Spice Girls even though the music video for "Wonderwall" by Oasis was playing.. Giles sat near her smiling like an idiot and clapping blissfully out of tune to Buffy's drunken karaoke. Faith laughed, and grabbed Giles' camera from the coffee table, walking up to Buffy. She would get much joy out of filming Buffy's antics and showing it to the "good" Slayer the day after.
"Hey Buff. Smile for the camera," she said as she clicked "RECORD."
"FAITH!" Buffy yelled happily, looking directly into the camera. "I always told you…" she began, twirling. She stumbled and finished the turn awkwardly before pointing at the camera again, completing her sentence. "…that I'd be a STAR."
Faith arched an eyebrow. "Yeah man, you're the star of the show. Who's the old man you got with ya?" She nodded at Giles.
Buffy looked at Giles as if realizing he was there for the first time. "Oh, him? That's my guy. He takes care of my stuff for me."
Both of them smiled brightly at Faith as if they just told her she's getting a new puppy. Faith was about to ask Buffy to elaborate on what that "stuff" was when all of a sudden, Buffy's face turned white and she ambled towards Faith. "Hey, I really don't feel so good…"
Faith backed away slowly, keeping the camera on Buffy the whole time. "Dude, go to the bathroom."
"Faith, seriously…" Buffy sank to her knees, and Faith knew she was ready to hurl. She thought of keeping the camera rolling for this little un-saintly moment of Buffy's, but Buffy would already kill her as is. No use catching her puking on tape to add fuel to the fire. She flicked the camera off quickly and looked around for something for Buffy to throw up into. They were definitely not going to make it to the bathroom.
And then she saw it. The pumpkin that Willow had spent hours carving, enticingly sitting a mere few feet away. Willow had carved Tara's face onto it along with the words "BAE" in block letters. Faith made sure to take a mental note of how well done it was before grabbing it and running over to Buffy. "Here!" Faith said, holding Buffy's hair as she moved the pumpkin under her fellow Slayer's chin. "Just let it out, it's okay."
With that, Buffy threw up into Willow's pumpkin. It was only after the river of vomit kept flowing that Faith remembered that the puke wasn't going to stay in a carved pumpkin. She froze in horror as Buffy Barf began dribbling out of the carefully carved eyes, nose and mouth of Pumpkin Tara.
"Oh…this is sick." Faith willed herself to look away, trying to decide if she should even begin to try cleaning the mess up. On one hand, if she ditched, Buffy would get full blame for ruining Willow's pumpkin, and Faith knew she'd own up to it too. In her state, she wouldn't remember Faith intervening, and the dark Slayer could just imagine her counterpart pandering for Willow's forgiveness. You know what?Faith thought to herself. That option sounds good.
She carefully got up, hoisting Buffy underneath her shoulders, and dragged her away from the pukey pumpkin, yet still close enough to the scene of the crime to make the evidence conclusive. Standing straight, she looked at Buffy for a moment, looking all sweaty and nasty. "Dammit," Faith said aloud to herself. Maybe she was going soft, but she hated to leave Buffy in that state. She'd have enough to deal with when she woke up, so Faith figured she'd soften the blow a little. She made her way to the kitchen, where she dampened a wash cloth and grabbed a water bottle from the fridge. After swiping a thin blanket from a stack on the couch, she knelt down next to a nearly sleeping Buffy. Faith gingerly held Buffy's face, wiping away stray barf from the corners of her mouth with the wash cloth.
Buffy smiled. "You're being nice, really, to me. Thanks for the taking care of me."
"Yeah, yeah." Faith couldn't help smiling back at Buffy's misconstrued words. She smoothed the Slayer's hair and carefully laid the blanket over her, placing the water bottle next to her head. "Be sure to drink some of that, okay?"
Buffy gave a barely perceptible nod, her eyes closed as she lifted the blanket up to her chin. Faith got up and crossed her arms, satisfied with her work. Now, where was that camera? She could still nab some awesome footage from three other Scoobies that she had yet to find. Faith spotted it lying on the table where she'd left it before Buffy's little incident, and went to get it.
"Hey!"
Faith jumped, startled as a hand grabbed her arm before she could reach the camera. Giles was holding on to her , swaying dangerously with a mischievous glint in his eyes. "I'm gonna tell!"
Faith wrenched her arm away from the highly intoxicated Watcher, eyeing him with exasperation. "You're gonna tell on me for what?" she said, her tone droll.
"You ruined Willow's pumpkin! Her very accurately detailed pumpkin. I saw you!" He pointed frantically at it.
"Uh, that would be your girl B here. She ruined it." Faith shrugged, throwing her hands up as if to say "sorry that you're totally wrong."
"No! NO IT DAMN WELL WASN'T! YOU ALWAYS DO THIS. YOU BETRAY AND LIE." Giles was becoming frantic, sweating profusely and pointing at Faith somewhat violently.
Faith laughed at him because he looked like an insane spaz. "Chill out, G!" She put a hand on his shoulder. "Listen, I'll turn myself in if you do one thing for me. Okay?" Giles was teetering again, full of so much liquor that Faith new he'd drop if she pushed him. She lightly pushed him and he fell to the ground, unconscious for the time being. Faith listened to make sure she didn't accidentally kill him with her Slayer strength, and when she heard him snoring she picked up the camera again and walked away.
He had annoyed her too much to get the blanket and water bottle treatment, so Faith left him on the ground in his own filth as she went to find a drunken Scooby. Her wish was granted as she could hear someone in the bathroom, gleefully humming to themselves. She smiled devilishly as she clicked "RECORD", nudging the door open with the camera.
She was met with the sight of Anya, tube of candy-corn flavored lip gloss in hand, applying it all over her face.
"Anya! Hey, lookin good." Faith focused the lense on Anya's glistening face. She looked so gross, and Faith couldn't stop laughing.
"What?" Anya stopped applying lip gloss to her eyebrows and looked at Faith. "What the hell is so funny?"
"You're doin' it all wrong." Faith said. "That stuff's candy. You're supposed to drink it. Tip it and try it!" She made sure to keep the camera on Anya, waiting to get the perfect shot of her shooting lip gloss. Except Anya looked up at her with a very pissed off expression.
"Nice try. Tried to kill Xander once and now you're trying to kill me? Is this payback? I'm not stupid."
"You sure about that? You look pretty stupid right now." Faith knew she was making Anya mad. And drunk pissed off Anya was exactly what Faith wanted to see. It was all for the camera.
"This is toxic. And you know what?" Anya took the tube of lip gloss and cracked it in half with her bare hands. "If you think it tastes so good YOU DRINK IT." She threw the halves at Faith, who watched in slow horror as a gush of candy corn lip gloss landed right in her eye, clouding her vision with orange gunk.
"OW! WHAT THE HELL? SON OF A BITCH!" Faith cried as she turned off the camera.
"AND YOU KNOW WHAT?" Anya yelled. "COSMOPOLITAN MAGAZINE SAID MEN LIKE LOTS OF LIP GLOSS AND THAT MORE IS BETTER AND I WANT TO MAKE XANDER HAPPY SO I AM NOT WRONG HERE, YOU ARE."
"PUTTING IT ALL OVER YOUR FACE IS NOT WHAT THEY MEANT DUMBASS!" Faith glanced around quickly and realized there were no alcohol bottles or cans around. "SO YOU'RE NOT EVEN DRUNK?! THIS IS SOBER SHIT RIGHT HERE?!" Faith screamed through orange haze.
"I WILL PUNCH YOU FAITH!" Anya yelled, charging towards the Slayer. Faith easily cold-clocked her and let her fall to the ground. Then she went over to the sink where she carefully flushed her eye out. When she looked at her reflection, she saw that one eye was normal and one eye was watery, red and irritated. "Hot," she said before looking one last time at Anya's lip gloss covered face plastered to the bathroom linoleum. Nope, she wasn't getting a water bottle or blanket either. Faith decided to leave the camera and closed the bathroom door behind her, fed up with the night. All she had wanted to do was get some blackmail footage from the Scoobies, but all she'd actually done was play nanny to Buffy and knock out Giles and Anya.
Yeah, she was ready to head home for the night.
She made her way into the kitchen to grab her jacket, but was intercepted by Willow.
"Ew, Faith, your eye. It's disgusting." Willow said.
"Oh thank you. You look stunning tonight as well." Faith said gleefully sarcastic. "I'm going home."
"Wait!" Willow said, dropping her voice to a whisper. "I need your help." She walked right up to Faith and held the Slayers face in her hands, looking into her eyes solemnly. Then she smooshed Faith's cheeks together. "Say "chubby bunny."
Faith yanked Willow's hands off of her. "Eff you."
Willow pouted. "What! It would've been really cute."
"Adios." Faith said, turning her back.
"No wait! For real this time." Willow said, pulling Faith back by her arm. "So when Tara gets drunk she gets insane. That's why I'm sober right now so I can make sure that she doesn't blow shit up."
Faith suddenly became very interested. "Hell yeah! Are you saying that you want me to help her blow shit up while you monitor us?"
"Not in the slightest." Willow said. "Tara picked up a bunch of full bottles of liquor and was smashing them against her own head. And know they're sitting here cracked in half but there is still some vodka to salvage. So I was wondering if you'd help me put it all into a pitcher so it's not wasted. I had to sell a lot of drugs to get the money for that stuff. Like, I had to put myself out there."
Faith smiled. "You've got it Red. I'm always willing to help a friend in need. The vodka, that is. Not you."
When they were all finished, they had collected enough vodka to fill a whole pitcher. Faith put it on the counter.
"Job well done, if I do say so myself." She bumped fists with Willow. Then Willow went in for a high five but Faith juked her out and slapped her in the face. "Bye!" Faith ran out the door before Willow could get her back.
Meanwhile, Willow stood for a few seconds holding her stinging cheek. It was a light slap, really, but Willow was feeling over-dramatic that night. She sank to her knees and contemplated about the meaning of life before ambling off to bed.
Outside, Faith was almost to her motorcycle when it blew up right before her eyes.
She stood, utterly shocked, as debris littered her feet. The night had literally blown up in her face.
Tara emerged from the bushes holding a detonation device. "That was for slapping Willow."
"MACLAY?!" Faith exclaimed. "I just slapped her a second ago! How did you rig up explosives that fast? I'd be more mad if I wasn't so impressed." She saluted Tara.
"Yeah, ever since the Gentlemen chased me I figured I better learn how to make bombs." She shrugged matter-of-factly.
Faith tilted her head. "That doesn't make sense. Even if you had known how to rig shit up back then how would that have come in handy? You would've needed, like, hand to hand combat skills. Or fire arms know-how."
Tara sighed. "Yeah it doesn't make any sense. But people usually don't question it so I never have to elaborate. Which is good because I have no answer. I'm just really into fire and stuff."
Faith smiled. "Oh, so that's why you like Willow."
Tara started walking away. "No. I like Willow because she's BAE."
With that, the night had officially concluded. Faith pulled a cigarette out of her pocket and bent down next to her flaming motorcycle to light it. Then she walked to a nearby convenience store to pick up some marshmallows and came back to roast them, again using the flames from her blown up motorcycle. She ended up sleeping in Buffy's backyard. Over the course of the night Buffy had brought out a blanket to her in a sleepwalking episode.
The next morning, Giles awoke sore and extremely parched. His mouth was all cottony and he could taste dried vomit. He desired nothing more than a nice cold glass of water. He trudged to the kitchen, looking for a glass. He noticed a pitcher on the counter, and was thankful for someone being thoughtful enough to leave water out for everyone. He filled his glass to the brim and then took a big swig.
…..
Faith awoke not to the sound of birds chirping, but to Giles screaming, "GUUUUOOOOOK! AHHHH! MOTHER &%*# %! THAT WAS NOT WATER!" She laughed hard out loud, and jumped up quickly when she saw Giles flipping her off from the window. She ran her ass outta there as he chucked his glass out the window towards her. She sprinted all the way back to her hotel.
What a stupid Halloween.