Another day, another nightmare. This one had a trampy blonde woman in a red dress smacking you around. You knew you were meant to fight this woman, knew you were meant to win but she was just so much… stronger! The woman's punches felt like a sledgehammer, her kicks like… something worse. You know it's just a dream but you felt so strongly like you had to protect someone, someone special. Was it weird that the first person you thought of was an albino thief?

Your someone special is special but for all the wrong reasons. And you think you might not mind that so much- what she is, how different she is- because really you're more similar than anyone can guess.

So you're not worried about that, just about how your dream seems… prophetic.

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Faith was bored. And cold. And possibly divorced from her ass.

Who knew it could be this cold in Sunnydale? Although… she was standing on the highest building in the tiny town and there was a pretty vicious wind.

She'd spent over an hour psyching herself up and then the last half hour thinking of every way this could go wrong.

"Ok. You can do this." She muttered. 'Or at least fail so monumentally that they put your name in the history books' Her inner voice added- and damn did that thing sound like Buffy Summers. Bitch.

The next five minutes were spent deciding which name they'd put in the history books- Her real name or her pseudonym. 'Faith' did of course sound wickedly cool, like Sting or Cher or- 'Jesus' her inner voice cut in.

"Shut up."

Faith heaved a sigh at the many hours of her life she had wasted in a reform school full of nuns to then get home and have to listen to her own mother's biblical drunken ramblings (not that she was a great expert on God having been thrown out of her own Catholic school for trying and succeeding to seduce a priest). It had taken her a long time to come to this decision and she wasn't backing out now.

"Suck it up Lehane."

The 'Buffy voice' snorted, ''Lehane?' that's a joke.' This time she ignored the annoying thing, choosing instead to take the high road.

The dark night felt like it was trying to creep into her bones along with the cold. Forcing down a shiver and zipping up her brand-new leather jacket (courtesy of her latest Daddy) she swung her legs over the edge of the building gripping on to the sides of the ladder.

Keeping her feet away from the rungs, she let gravity do the work for her. Air rushed past wafting her hair out as she grinned, delighting in the way the rough metal scraped her palms. She shot down the side of the building, her hands only latching on the last rung the second before she fell the sixteen feet to the alley below.

"Booyah!" She exulted, wondering where she'd picked that up from and when exactly she'd started sounding like such a dork.

Bending her legs as she landed on the concrete she let the vibrations from the impact buzz through her body, sending a pleasant tingle up her spine. Faith grinned, popping her collar and swaggering out the alley. She was so going to be earning her cookies tonight.

Twenty minutes later found her stationary. Not that she was wavering or hesitant or even entirely uncertain. This was just… a stop. Along the way. Definitely going to get the job done tonight. Definitely. Completely. Just needed a drink.

Not that she had to have a bit of Dutch Courage to get where she was going- she was just thirsty. And in a bar that was entirely out of the path of where she was meant to be going.

"Oh God, I'm procrastinating."

'Careful you don't choke on that big word' Buffy-Voice sniped. Faith mentally bitch-slapped her.

Ok, so spending all that time with the mayor was obviously starting to affect her but that didn't have to be a bad thing. A little 'self improvement' every now and then wasn't a completely awful thing. She bet Little Miss Perfect didn't know any words like 'procrastination'- she'd probably say it 'pro-cress-tination' and think it was something to do with a rise in imports of British sandwiches. Or maybe even that explanation was too complex for her?

How did a girl that stupid get to be so lauded anyway? ''Lauded'? You actually-?'

"Anything else?" The bartender asked, cutting off Buffy's voice, "We're closing soon."

She let his smokey breath wash over her and shook her head. Sometimes she thought she might like to start smoking but it reminded her too much of her mother and that was someone she resolutely didn't want to turn in to (regardless of whatever she shoved up her nose). Though it was nice to be reminded every now and then- there were good points as well as bad. "Just this." She grunted.

Any other night she'd have flirted and flashed a little cleavage so he'd let her take the rest of the open bottle home for free but tonight she had somewhere to be and- as she tried to keep reminding herself- she needed to be level-headed.

She tossed back the last of the JD and Coke (bubbles made it work its way into her bloodstream faster), giving out a tiny burp when she'd done. The bartender eyed her up-and-down with a look that clearly said he wanted to take the party back to his. Pervert.

'Paedophile' more likely- she wasn't wearing any make-up tonight and had just put her hair up into a ponytail with a band she'd found in her pocket. It made her look her age and she knew it. Not that that had been a problem when it came to ordering… definitely a paedophile.

She grunted a thanks and tossed a couple of notes down onto the bar top (probably a few more than necessary but who cares? It's not like it's her money anyway). The hairs on the back of her neck stood up as she felt his eyes following her movements out of the bar. Was she learning self-worth too? Jesus, she was going to start turning into the 'good slayer' if this kept up.

'As if you don't want that!' the voice jeered.

"Doy. Who doesn't?" Faith replied beneath her breath. "Wouldn't life be great if we were all Buffy fucking Summers?" Except then everyone would look the same and there'd be no one to actually do the worshiping… Wouldn't that be some kind of conundrum? What was a conundrum anyway?

She grabbed the hand reaching for her behind before it even reached the halfway mark. "You might want to rethink that Chump." Gripping his wrist tightly she gleefully waited for the sizzling and the screaming to start.

Only one of those two happened. His scream almost (but not quite) reached the pitch of 'glass shattering'.

Looking down at the limp hand in her grasp she wrinkled her nose slightly at the bone-shards poking out. Not that she was squeamish- she just didn't particularly like the idea of cutting herself on some jackass' splintered bone.

And since when did jackasses bother her anyway? They were good for a drink, a dance and, if they had stamina, maybe more… plus if they were vamps she could just stake them (she could probably stake the human ones now too since she was living with Daddy). This self-worth thing was probably going to start costing her some serious free highs. Not cool.

And why wasn't this guy burning?

His friends were, by now, futilely attempting to pry her fingers off of his decimated wrist. A blonde man in his early twenties, who might have been cute if it wasn't for his potbelly, was standing in front of her saying words she wasn't really listening to. She raised her hand to threaten him but then got bored and punched him instead.

He wasn't burning either. Why did she expect him to?

She let go of the guy's wrist and ducked as three burly men leapt over her head. This was so not her night. Luckily another group of men who'd been sitting by the bar had joined in the fight in her 'defence' so she didn't have to actually bother hitting anyone (although the adrenaline rush might have been fun) and could just go on her way- she did after all have a job to attend to.

And why the hell was she so obsessed with fire? Was it actually possible that there were a few more rungs down on the steps to crazy?

She was still puzzling away at that thought by the time she reached Buffy's street.

Only a few people were still out at this hour, mainly going home and definitely none on their own. They didn't notice her as it was so dark- streetlights in Sunnydale weren't top priority thanks to the Mayor and a hefty tax from the vampires. Still, her super-powered hearing pricked up at the sound of a car a few blocks away that seemed like it might be coming this way. Skirting into the front yards of the houses to better avoid detection, she slunk around the bushes, calling on every ounce of Slayer-grace to avoid cracking twigs and rustling leaves. She car rushed past, illuminating a low wall but not her crouched form beneath it. A moment later a couple walked past, oblivious as well.

She didn't really need to hide per se- who cares what they write in their witness statements? The mayor could clean up any mess she made- but it was fun and a little extra challenge alongside the main game.

'Game? Are you so screwed up now that you think this is a GAME?'

'No', the Slayer thought, this was better than any game- fighting against someone who matched her so perfectly yet knowing she'd get the reward whatever the outcome. He'd always love her; she wasn't stupid enough to do this just for a job! And she wasn't an idiot, she knew he hadn't thought of her that way from the start, she was probably everything he hated… but, now her flaws were amusing- adorable even- to him. She knew she would do almost anything for his continued affection yet she also knew she didn't have to.

And she loved it.

This must be what Buffy felt like every day. Bitch.

Speaking of which… Faith smirked, slinking across the lawn to the old tree that grew right next to the house. Bending her legs slightly she sprung straight up, latching onto a low-hanging branch. She rocked her body forward and back then threw her legs up above her head, feet landing on the top just moments after she'd let go. From there it was just a short climb up and across to the branch she really wanted.

A dark chuckle left her throat as she pressed a palm to the cold windowpane, looking past it to the figure asleep in the bed. "Hello, Cupcake."

Tickling her fingers across the glass she almost leapt back in surprise when Buffy moved as if in response, settling instead for a small scuttle as the light was turned on. She watched as Buffy slid out of the bed and moved about the room collecting clothes and pulling them on with a grace and stealth identical to Faith's own.

"Sneaking out, B? You bad girl…"

'Probably going out to fulfil her sacred duty' the little voice taunted.

Faith rolled her eyes and considered smacking her head against the tree trunk to shut the shitting thing up. "Whatever." She wrapped her arms around the branch above and swung round to crouch on the roof next to the window, the slight tapping noises of her feet hitting the slates drowned out by the clunking of the window opening.

"Shit!" Buffy whispered, making Faith grin. The tiny slayer was obviously sneaking out.

'To do her sacred duty' the voice reiterated.

Watching her opposite jump down from the tree and sneak off across the grass, Faith shook her head, "Nope, she's off somewhere she doesn't want her precious mommy to know about…"

Apparently killing Buffy Summers in her sleep would have to wait for another night.