Title: Tired
Author: Emily
Character: Nina
Rating: PG 13
Summary: "They're in the business of saving souls at Wolfram and Hart, you know."
Spoilers/Timeline: Angel season five. Oh and Nina's the werewolf girl from 5.03.

Nina can't be strong any more. Three nights a month though, she is strong enough to rip out the throats of the two people she loves most in the world. This doesn't scare her. The fact that she sometimes wants to is what scares her. She sees Angel and he is clearly strong, perfectly carved out in flesh and death and ready to take on the world. Or, that's what she used to think before she saw it as the illusion it was. Now she thinks he is tired of taking on the world and tired of being strong.

Fred, who she is glad to call a friend, is bubbling over with enthusiasm and ready to save souls. They're in the business of saving souls at Wolfram and Hart, you know. Yet even Fred can't keep this up all the time and Nina knows because Fred told her. She told her that sometimes she wants to sleep and sleep, let the world fall apart and let the souls save themselves. She told her that she doesn't even do much but sometimes it's too much.

Nina hears a lot when she's at Wolfram and Hart those three nights. She sees a lot too, like Fred's obvious fascination with Spike. Nina gets it too, she knows basically nothing about him but he fascinates her too. Of course he's so close to death that she tries to avoid him because she is tired and scared of death.

She and Angel talk sometimes about what it's like. 'It' being the indescribable state of being somebody - no, something - else half the time. He doesn't tell her much about his past, she suspects she doesn't want to know but she is morbidly curious all the same. He says to her that once he knew a girl who could take on the whole world and make it look easy. Nina is sure he managed to do that himself once but she has seen the man behind the tired lies and quick comebacks and that must have been long ago. She asked where the girl was, laughed and said something about how he should go save the world with her. He laughed back - even though there was nothing funny because there is nothing funny about the things you lose - and said, someday. Nina smiled sadly, sadly because not much ever comes of 'someday's.

Nina is tired whenever she visits. Tired from the change, tired from being awake all night and tired from all she cannot do. She can't be strong for anyone else so she tries to be strong for herself and watches herself failing. She knows it's wrong but she is relieved when she leaves, it's another 28 days of being far from the weight of the world. It stills weighs on her mind though and she can't stop thinking of how it must weigh on them all.

They're in the business of saving souls, you know and Nina knows because they saved hers. She could be that little bit stronger if only she believed they could save everyone's. If only she didn't know that eventually, eventually they would just be too tired.