The people at the Shop realized Amanda's interest in destroying Nikita. They knew that that was her priority.

That didn't stop them from forcing her to sit through unrelated meetings about work being done elsewhere, and asking for her opinion. She gave them as much attention as she could, answering questions concisely in the interest of getting it over with so she could get back to trying to end the problem of Nikita once and for all.

She'd been so close, framing Nikita for the death of the President – but once again, one of her allies had underestimated Nikita and allowed her to escape, which allowed Nikita a chance, however small, of circumventing Amanda's carefully laid plans.

It would have been easy to simply promulgate a clearer picture of Nikita from her walk through the White House, to have everyone in the country know what she looked like, and be looking for her; but this way, the torment for Nikita was more exquisite. Plus, were everyone to know who she was, there would be nothing stopping her and her allies from what would be effectively a suicide run to, at least, take Amanda herself down with them.

And that would never do.

Amanda did not fool herself into believing that Nikita had given up. This was delicate. Nikita needed to be off balance enough to keep her off her game without quite getting to the point that she had nothing left to lose. It was a matter of psychology, and she was an expert in all kinds of that, from child to adult.

Everyone around her was standing up. Good. The meeting was over. She muttered pleasantries and went back to her office.

On their way out, Nikita and Michael and Ryan and all the rest had blown up whatever was left of Division headquarters. Cheap, empty symbolism, but it meant that they had to have retreated to a safe house – and as hot as Nikita could be if someone looked at their leaked picture correctly, no doubt one fairly close by, somewhere in Virginia or Maryland.

So, while the remnants of the so-called "Dirty thirty" were dead, Amanda still had people she could call – those loyal to money, if nothing else. These people were scouring the area looking for any sign of Nikita, Michael. Ryan, Alex, or even Birkhoff or Sonya, though the latter two very rarely went topside.

She had gotten no messages yet. But she didn't hire incompetents. Eventually, they would find Nikita, and the noose would tighten.

X

Faith was rarely caught completely off-guard. This was one of those times. How Xander didn't run the SUV off the road, she had no clue. "What?"

Oh, she trusted Nikita when she said she was framed, but still, while the Academy had connections and cash, it wasn't like they could just whistle up a get-out-of-jail-free card for someone the world thought had killed the president. Wasn't like Faith paid a shitload of attention to politics, but what she'd seen of the woman, she'd liked.

So this favor had a shot of getting them a whole lot of attention, and Slayers and Watchers really didn't do well with a whole lot of attention.

Xander said, "I echo that, 'what?' And I think we're gonna need the whole story before we get back, 'cause there's no way we're getting anyone else involved in this without knowing what we're getting ourselves into."

Nikita nodded. "Fair enough. I wasn't expecting you to go in blind. Faith, remember when I told you about Amanda . . . ?"

X

The driver – a guy with an eyepatch, Xander something, Nikita thought – took them to a nearby Arby's. Not exactly the place she would have chosen for a debriefing, but it wasn't her show, and it certainly wasn't the first place Division would look for her.
They ordered and sat down. Xander took his tray to the next booth over, and there was no way he was just a driver. He carried himself, to a lesser extent, like Claudia and Gigi had, and had an array of scars – and that was only where she could see. He wasn't trained like Nikita was, and he wasn't ex-military, but she knew better than to dismiss him.

Still, he wasn't the one she was here to talk to. "So," Faith said, biting into a potato cake. "What's Division and why the fuck did you think we were associated with them?"

Right down to business. Nikita liked that. When you lied and were lied to for a living, hearing someone saying what they felt flat out was a welcome relief. "Division is a top-secret organization associated with the US government. They carry out missions that are better off not being officially associated with the administration."

"You kill people," Faith said bluntly.

Nikita nodded. "That's not all we – they – do. There's also blackmail, theft, and flat out espionage."

"We, they?"

"I was one of them. I got tired of doing that kind of work, but it's not like they have a retirement plan."

"The only way you leave is foot first?" Faith asked.

"Exactly. I got out, and now I'm trying to figure out how to bring them down." She realized how it sounded when she said it. Still. Didn't make it any less true.

"So, to get back to my first question, what made you think we had anything to do with them?"

So Nikita explained her reasoning – and also when she'd figured out that they weren't Division, giving them a short description, naming only Percy and Amanda as the two biggest problems, and ending with, "Division never had anything to do with demons or vampires, apart from being taught how to fight them as best we could and get away. Didn't mean you didn't have something to do with the government, but at least it meant you weren't a training ground for Division."

"So you were watching us to what? Get the girls out?"

"If I'd thought it was the right thing, yes." She'd faced worse odds before.

"You said that 'recruited''s a bullshit word for how Division got you to work for them," Faith said. "It was the same way for me when I got the job." Faith then gave her a brief summary of the history of the Slayer, punctuated by occasional chuckles from Xander. Nikita had no idea what he was laughing at, but after the fourth time Faith said, "You think you can do any better, you can get your ass over here and do it yourself." This made the man crack up, for some reason. She growled but finished the story, following with, "Sounds to me like Division's kinda what the Council used to be – except that while they weren't the ones doing the drafting, they sure as shit wanted to run our lives afterward."

"But girls are still getting drafted," Nikita said.

"No, they ain't. They ain't got a say in whether they get the powers, but they get a say on whether they want to use 'em full-time. No one's forced to do it, any more. Girl tells us to fuck off and leave her alone, we do just that. Most don't. A few have. And we sure as shit don't kill 'em if they try to leave."

Being a Division agent for so long had damn near worn Nikita down with cynicism and suspicion. Everything everyone said was open for question, open for debate. Amanda made damn sure you thought that way. But she was fighting that. Everyone could lie, but that didn't mean everyone was at every possible moment.

"I believe you," she said.

"Yeah. I think you do. Still. Wanna see what's going on for yourself, make sure we ain't lying to you?"

"If you want." She had a mission; but she'd taken time out from trying to find someone to recruit to help her take down Division to checking up on these girls, so an extra few hours wasn't going to kill her. "I don't need it, though."

"Okay. 'cause I'm thinking I owe you one. You saved a couple of my girls tonight."

Shaking her head, Nikita said, "That's not why I did it."

"I know. And that's why we're letting you in. Unless –"

Unless?

"One question," Xander said. "Are you related to anyone named Warren?"

She and Faith said "Huh?" at the same time. By herself, she said, "No. Why?"

"No reason. Nothing for you to worry about if you're not. Otherwise, we're good."

"Five by five. Anything holding you back, Nicky?"

"My schedule's wide open."

Grinning wickedly, Faith said, "Good. Let's go."

X

Faith said, "Amanda? Yeah. Her and some dude named Percy were the big troublemakers, right?"

"Yeah. Percy's not a problem any more – a couple hundred foot drop will do that to most people. Amanda, though, is still out there and still doing her damnedest to destroy me and everyone I love."

"And so your first thought was to find someone else to throw into the line of fire?" Xander asked. "Gee, thanks."

And Nikita said, "You know what? Forget it. This was a bad idea. If I don't want to get my friends hurt, I shouldn't try to get anyone else hurt, either. I'll do this myself. Just do me a favor and drop me off."

"Whoa," Xander said. "I was just kidding. Sorry. Sometimes my mouth gets ahead of my brain. I didn't mean it."

Sighing, Nikita said, "Doesn't matter. It's still true."

"The fuck it is," Faith said. "It ain't throwing people into the line of fire if they know damn well what they're getting into. You saying this is dangerous and someone could die? Nothing we don't do on a regular basis, except your bad guys got guns. Look. I owe you, and just 'cause I think you're the kind of person who'll let me go on that, I'm saying right now I'll help you even if you tell me you're not calling in that favor. And while we got other things we're doing we can probably scrape up a few other people as well. Pinky and Claudia are still around, for one."

"And I think Willow was looking for something to do," Xander said.

"Right. There we go, Nicky. You got your help. We good to go?"

A few seconds later, Nikita, "Yeah."

"Good. Now, let's get back to this President thing."