Faith ducked under the powerful blow, kicked the demon in the gut and buried her knife up to its hilt in the Skilosh demon's third eye, the one in the back of his skull, when the force of her blow forced the demon to bow to her. The knife bit through bone and flesh easily, a twist cracked the demon's skull open and she ripped it free with a smooth yank. Collapsing bonelessly to the floor, grey brain and yellow blood leaked from the hole, coloring the grey skin and red stripes of the demon in a disturbing manner.
The second demon screamed at the death of its compatriot and rushed her, tongue flicked out like a throwing knife, only to be dodged as easily. A hand snaked out, catching the tongue and yanking the demon forward onto the blade as it sliced through his gut. Faith bellowed as she stabbed the demon a dozen more times, hands a blur as she perforated the demon's guts. A scream burst from his lips, past his still-imprisoned tongue and finally Faith pulled back, blade rising in a sharp arc to cut through the muscular appendage right next to his lips.
Choking on its own blood, the demon swayed there, staring at nothing, agony blinding it to the first stroke at its throat. The next two it saw coming, but couldn't muster the energy to dodge as Faith took its head off. A neat trick with just her dagger.
Its yellow blood was far too thick to fountain out the way most creatures would have, but the pressure of its still-pumping heart was enough to cause it to spill over and down onto the creature's shirt, at least until its heart finally realized that his head had come off.
In all honesty, that probably wasn't necessary, though Wes had been a little unclear on exactly how much damage these beasties could take, but the ones they'd run into outside had gone down under the automatic weapons fire of the SWAT team he'd rustled up to back her up. It had been Faith's position that she didn't need the help, but since Wes wasn't sure how many of the Skilosh demons had broken off from the main group, he'd insisted. Especially since she was unwilling, or unable, to learn the ritual necessary to undo the demon's nasty habit of impregnating humans with their spawn.
Faith had argued with that, until she realized that they had dicks on their tongues and liked to fuck people's skulls, literally! After that, she was sufficiently grossed out by their existence that she was willing to take all the assistance available, if only so she wouldn't have to deal with the poor bastards the Skilosh had kidnapped to form this nest.
The SWAT team had secured the handful of streets in the tiny town the retreating demons had overrun. Any demon which stuck its head outside would get picked off by a sniper, or automatic weapons fire, but sending the humans, even heavily armed humans into close quarters with the demons was probably a bad idea.
Which made the fact that the three humans in town with the knowledge, and the gear, to fix the demon incubators the Skilosh had dragged into the church, had followed her into the church, pretty stupid. At least in Faith's not at all humble opinion. But with the British Bitch in the lead, they hadn't taken no for an answer. At least the British Bitch had a hell of a right, not that she'd have any chance if Faith hadn't been right out of a coma, still it showed spunk. More spunk than any of the Brits she knew had shown. Except her own Watcher.
Faith shook of that thought and gave an irritated look at the shotguns the Brits cradled like favored children. Given those, her usual solution to idiocy was probably gonna be more trouble than it was worth. One was large and was therefore mentally dubbed the Big Brit and the other one's head was clean shaven and dubbed the Bald Brit.
Ignoring the stupidity and the stupid, Faith pressed on, deeper into the church, breaking into the main hall. There she also ignoring the curled, chained, helpless figures lining the floor and the walls. She was not like them. She was strong once again and the demons would know fear.
The three in the front of the church, standing by the baptismal font, did not show fear, even as she flourished her blade, sending a thick, viscous line of yellow blood across the row of seats between them. They, being as stupid as the Brits, chose to rush her. Faith moved to kick a seat towards one of them, which would buy her time to take down one of the other two, but a trio of shotgun blasts, incredibly loud in the close confines of the church, sent one of the demons to the ground, blasted to hamburger as her human escorts accidentally all shot the same one and damn near deafened her.
Usually her heightened senses were an asset, but not when three shotguns went off less than ten feet away. Her hands wrapped around her head, shielding her ears, far too late. The Skilosh demons came on, ignoring the deafening racket, or perhaps they were simply desperate to close before the others could fire again.
Faith managed the kick she'd planned, but instead of flinging the chair into the charging demon's face, the flimsy chair just shattered, sending fragments of whatever weak-ass wood it was made of at the charging demon which didn't do a damn thing but put her off balance as one of the demons barreled into her.
With an effort she forced herself not resist, but roll with the impact, spinning them over further than the demon had intended, ending up on top. A quick jerk snapped the demon's neck. As she rose, instinct drove her head to jerk out of the way as the second demon's tongue snapped towards the back of head. Faith caught the disgusting appendage as it flew over her shoulder and tried to cut through it, only to realize she'd dropped her blade, thankfully before covering her ears, and that the jabbing pain she'd ignored in her roll had been the abandoned blade carving a neat slice into her side as she rolled straight over it.
The demon whose tongue she held managed to pound a blow against her back, driving her forward, but since her grip never faltered, that only succeeded in causing her to rip his tongue further out of his head, yanking that head and attached body forward as well. Faith planted a back kick into the demon's gut and yanked forward, ripping the tongue out of his skull with a disgusting squelching sound. The Skilosh fell back clutching its throat and choking on blood. A shudder ran through Faith at the spongy, disintegrating, texture of the appendage in her hand. She tossed it aside and scooped up her knife in a single fluid motion, approaching the keening demon eagerly. Only the fact that the demon with the broken neck chose to grab her leg and trip her prevented her from finishing off the weeping beast.
A snap kick knocked the clinging demon's head back with what was very clearly the snap of bone, but did not result in the demon releasing its grip. Another trio of shotgun blasts above her blasted the broken, bleeding, choking mess that had once been a fearsome demon, into hamburger. The others had been waiting for her to clear the line of fire, which the demon had kindly helped with.
A second kick bought her the time to sit up and bring her knife down in one of the pair of eyes that decorated the front of the demon's skull. That did cause the clawed hand to spasm and release her. On the theory that a broken neck hadn't stopped the beast, so more violence was needed (and certainly not because she was just pissed off about being tripped), Faith twisted her blade against the bone of the demon's skull.
The dagger had been a gift from the Mayor and though Faith didn't think it was magical in any way, she had to admit that it remained sharp and unchipped despite rather rough use. In this case, the thick steel of the blade easily survived the twisting force brought to bear by an angry Slayer. The Skilosh's skull and brains did not.
Faith vaulted easily to her feet. "Deal with them," she waved a hand at the former prisoners, current incubators. "I'll secure the rest of the building."
The British Bitch objected and attempted to follow her on the grounds that she would need someone to watch her back. As this was a patently ridiculous position to take about the Slayer, Faith didn't bother to respond beyond snorting loudly and heading out to search the remainder of the building. Unsurprisingly, there were no demons remaining in the church, though there was a fresh body in the streets, a neat shot drilled through its skull. Apparently it had attempted to flee from the sounds of battle (or at least of shotguns) only to be taken down by one of the pair of SWAT snipers on overwatch.
Faith grinned and waved a hand out the window, then stepped out, briefly conscious of her rather bloodstained appearance, then shrugged to herself as she moved on to the next building to clear it. One or another of the hot boys on the SWAT team would say yes, she was sure of that. Then she took a deep sniff and realized exactly how bad the demon blood smelled. She was mostly sure of that.
On the other hand, maybe she'd take a shower first, this place hadn't been taken over long enough for the water to get turned off. She went through the houses and handful of shops like a buzzsaw. Four demons flushed out into SWAT's firing lines, three more taken down one on one, with a few more demonic incubators located. Despite her irritation at the British Bitch, she did indeed mark each of those doors with chalk so they knew where to go next.
It was efficient and even a little pleasant to work with a team. It was nice having someone watching your back, at least conceptually. But she had to admit, that sorta fight didn't get her engine revving quite the way one-on-one, or one-on-three fights usually did. It was less combat, more pest control. And Faith was a Slayer, not an exterminator. If SWAT could do her job, then what was she?
Grumpy ruminations burned away when she reached the next house too late. A little house, with a neatly trimmed yard, everything put away neat and tidy, a handful of military medals framed, a single picture of a happy couple in an old style military uniform and an even older style of dress. The whole place reminded her of her grandfather's little apartment from back before he died, or the Mayor's house…back before he died…
And so Faith was in a bad mood when she found the inevitable little old man bound and helpless in the closet. She was in an even worse mood when the Skilosh demon's spawn ripped its way out of the man's body and leapt for her throat. It came out full sized and looked like all the rest, except for the fact that its grey skin was streaked with the blood and viscera of its host.
Faith reacted to that characteristically. It was then that she learned that, despite what Wesley had said, she could, in fact, kill a Skilosh demon with her bare hands. All it took was sufficient fury to knock the creature down, get on top of it and pound its head flat as a pancake. Her hands were bleeding and raw by the time she was done, but the demon was almost as thoroughly dead as the old man.
With that visceral reminder of the Skilosh's rapid reproductive cycle and the fact that they came out hungry, facts which Wesley had, in fact, imparted in his pre-mission briefing, but which Faith had not bothered to recall until seeing them firsthand, Faith took off like an arrow from her favorite, sadly lost, bow.
Fortunately the SWAT team on overwatch did not shoot her, though it was a close run thing when she came bursting out of the house. There was a crackle of curses from the radio she'd been issued but hadn't bothered to learn how to use. Ignoring that she raced back to the church faster than any Human could. It was about half a mile away and she was there in less than a minute, breathing deep but even. Faith didn't slow as she burst through the church doors and sped towards the main hall.
A shotgun swung towards her automatically, in the hands of one of the Big Brit, the one who had a surprising amount of grace for a big man, who had, her eyes noticed instinctively, enough muscle that she might have considered using him to burn off steam if it weren't for the fact that he was a Brit and they always had big ol' sticks up their ass, which limited their flexibility. Other instincts controlled her reaction, which was to kick the gun away before it could come to bear. It slid out of his hands, discharging into the floor as the force of the blow ripped it from his hands.
There was an awkward silence then and an even more awkward conversation in which she explained that one of the Skilosh spawn had popped out of one of the victims. She certainly hadn't come back to warn them, or protect them, or anything. And certainly she hadn't come back to ensure that the other victims survived. No, no, no, she was there to…to…because she'd been running out of demons to fight and if the spawn were coming out, then lots would come out here and she'd have the opportunity for a real fight.
And that was similarly why she escorted them through the other buildings. Three other spawn burst forth before the Brits could finish treating all of the Skilosh prisoners and she stumbled over a few other Skilosh who died quickly, without permitting the others to use their shotguns. Fortunately, they had sufficient discipline not to fire with her in the way, even with a demon rushing them.
With the town secure, the Brits work wasn't over, they still had to do clean-up of the bodies and the injured and they would not stop blithering about how to keep the demon's presence secret. Blah, blah, water contamination, blah, blah, gang with delusions of culthood, blah, blah, Satanists. Faith had no interest in their cover story ideas, or carrying corpses so, after being bullied into letting the Bald Brit patch up the little cut on her back, she went in search of a shower.
The Bald Brit tried to argue that she shouldn't do that, as it would wreck his work, but when faced with the suggestion that he join her and make sure she didn't, he blushed a brilliant red and accepted her second suggestion that he patch her up again afterwards. Faith obviously did not intend to bother wasting time with that. It would scar a little, but with Slayer healing she'd be fine.
A quick shower later, Faith was pulling her pants back on, frowning all the while. The usually tight garments had grown loose given the amount of weight she'd lost while comatose. Indeed, her usually lush figure had shrunk to something more skeletal. Still, she'd caught a couple of the SWAT boys looking and was sure that the Brits had been looking too, they were just better at hiding it.
Fully dressed, she went in search of the cutest of the cops. A big man, with enough muscle and grace to keep up with her for a while. She frowned slightly at that thought, maybe Buffy had had the right idea, a Vamp might have been able to keep up longer. They didn't have the strength, or stamina of a Slayer, but they came a lot closer than a Human. Of course only a Slayer could really keep up with another Slayer. Faith shrugged that thought off, then snorted, wondering for a moment how well Wes could keep up with his Vampire cheerleader.
A shudder crawled over her flesh as she realized she'd just been thinking about Wesley Wyndam-Pryce having a sex life. Faith spotted the cop she was looking for, gathered with a group that were piling up the demon bodies. That didn't matter, she'd done her job and now she wanted to play. A few words in the cop's ear and a glare at his superior and they were on their way.
A very pleasant twenty minutes later, Faith was ready to be out of this hick town and definitely ready to be away from the cop who'd wanted to cuddle after and clucked over her cuts and bruises like a mother hen. Faith had no patience with such things and was gone before he managed to get his pants back on.
Unfortunately, the Brits were her ride and they had a bunch more work to do. The Bitch tried to convince her that she should help them carry bodies, but Faith was real clear that she was the muscle, not the maid.
It took three hours for the team to finish their work, while Faith camped out in one of the houses with a relatively nice television and popcorn (she did wash a few things first as even her disdain for prissy cleanliness was overcome by viscous yellow blood stains). It took her a while to arrange herself so there was no pressure placed on the cut on her back, but once in place she didn't want to move, at least until she reached the point where it had been long enough that she was considering going to find the cop for a second round.
Unfortunately, the Brits intercepted her as soon as she stepped out and insisted they all head out. Faith would have argued, but apparently the cops had gathered all the survivors and left, dragging them off to the hospital, leaving her behind with the Brits and a truck full of demon corpses.
The trip back to Wes's absurd mansion passed in a blur as Faith let her mind drift the way it always did on car trips, the flashing scenery acting as an almost hypnotic relaxant. She didn't even know the her hands were flicking her knife through complicated, dangerous looking patterns until the Big Brit started whining about it. That jolted her out long enough to almost make her drop the blade and encouraged her to run somewhat more elaborate patterns, ones which simply wouldn't have been possible for people without Slayer speed and reflexes.
By the time they made it back, the Big Brit was almost catatonic, only his eyes were moving, tracking the blade, as the rest of him froze solid in the instinctive hope that if he didn't move, the predator wouldn't see him.
The Bitch jerked him out of it by pulling him out of the truck and away from the blade. A shove sent him towards the back as they began to unload the pile of corpses. Sheathing the blade at her waist, Faith headed inside, passing Harmony dressed in the dullest clothes she'd ever seen the preppy girl wear.
After hours on the road, both ways, Faith wanted the ridiculously large tub that her bathroom had. Some part of her thought that the bathroom was a bribe to get her to stick around, or a trick to make her soft. The rest of her laughed at that, not because it was a foolish idea, but because either way, she'd do what she always did with things like that, take the bribe and do what she'd planned to do anyway, or take the luxury, then not get soft.
All thoughts on that point were driven from her head by the outfit Wesley Wyndam-Pryce was wearing. The usually prissily businesslike ex-Watcher was wearing a rubber apron she'd only ever seen butchers wear, over jeans and a ragged t-shirt, the likes of which Faith hadn't believed he would own.
That actually did manage to distract her from the attraction of a long bath. Faith stood there slack-jawed, staring at him. Wes cocked his head and stared right back at her for a moment, lips moving as he counted to see how long it took Faith to manage words. Twenty-three seconds, as it turns out.
"What the hell?" she asked.
"I hear the operation was a success and you were most…effective in the field. So I'm uncertain what has surprised you now."
"You can stand there, wearing that, and ask what surprises me? Seriously?"
"Oh! This," he waved a hand. "It's my dissection ensemble. Harmony-approved, though that took a bit of convincing."
"That does not answer any questions. At all."
"Well, when dissecting demons, bits tend to splatter. Not as much splatter as vivisection causes, as your ensemble demonstrates."
Faith grabbed her head in irritation, ran a hand halfway through her mane, then swore vilely as she accidentally yanked matted hair. She tried to remember what vivisection meant, then decided she didn't care. "Why would you be dissecting demons?" She finally managed to ask.
"Skilosh demon parts are valuable, both mystically and materially."
"Oooo, what's my cut?" Faith asked with a bounce that was not as impressive as it usually would have been, given her recently comatose state.
"Are you going to come help dissect demons?"
"Depends."
"On?"
"How much you'll pay."
"Not that much, and you've already made plenty today."
"No I haven't."
"Well, if you say so, I guess you'd know better than I how much is plenty, but personally, five thousand dollars in a day seems like plenty."
"Wait, what?" Faith asked.
"You weren't listening to the briefing, were you?"
"Of course not! But I would have heard you if you'd said you were paying me five grand."
"I'm not."
"But you said—"
"The city of Cleveland is paying you five grand."
Faith caught him by the shoulder and squeezed hard, "Okay. Explain. In small words. Why is Cleveland paying me five grand?"
"At the briefing," she squeezed hard (for a Human, not for a Slayer, as that would have shattered his collarbone) and he just grinned at her, "I explained that we have two contracts with the city of Cleveland. One is for press releases and cover-ups regarding events like those which just occurred—"
"Right, fine, helping with the cover-up, and how did I do that?"
"You didn't, in fact you didn't even help move the bodies, as I understand it."
"How did you know that?"
"The same way I know you did well in the field, Jane called in and reported, since she took her cell phone, instead of leaving it behind."
"I don't have a cell-phone!"
"Because you didn't pick it up. I mentioned it at the briefing." Faith stared at him. "You know, you might be less surprised if you listened to me when I talk."
"Okay, I no longer care about why I'm getting the money, now I just want to know where it is."
"In your bank account." Faith stared at him. "The one I had set up for you? Into which I deposited all your assets I could find? As well as the portions of the sale of your apartment I managed to get my hands on?" Faith continued to stare at him, her hand falling from his shoulder. A flush began to climb up thin cheeks, "Which I told you about four different times? All the papers for it are in the bag I gave you?" Faith practiced her completely blank stare, partly to cover embarrassment at having missed something that actually mattered and partly because it was clearly infuriating her ex-Watcher, "Do you listen to anything I say?"
She couldn't resist either the smirk crossing her lips, or the urge to say, "Sorry, what was that?"
A glare bounced off her, then a smirk crawled over his lips, "So I assume you don't want to know anything more about the account?"
"Since all the details are in my bag, no, I think I'm good," Faith countered.
"Argh!" Wes threw his hands up and tried to slide around her.
He failed as Faith caught his shoulder again. "I do have one question."
"You lost the right to ask questions when you ignored my answers!" Wes snapped.
Her hand tightened, stopping him from pulling away. "I need to know why it's five grand. See, if you're cheating me, then I'll rip your head off, put it on a stick, and carry it around until it becomes one of those little shrunken heads, then I'll put a chain through it and wear like a necklace so everyone knows not to cheat me."
"Well that was…graphic," Wes said, but he didn't flinch, or retreat. Not that the latter was really an option, with her grip on his shoulder. Nor had he winced under the iron grip of the Slayer, who was, against her will, impressed. "But, your concerns are unwarranted. Resolving the situation required the completion of two tasks, the elimination of the demons and curing their victims. You refused to participate in the latter, therefore you were entitled only to a portion of the funds which paid for the former. As the contract did not allocate the amounts between the two tasks, I assigned them equal weight. Total payment was $20,000. Based on my understanding of events, I allocated you the same amount as the rest of the team put together. If you wish to argue that was in error, I will be happy to hear you, however, I should point out that this was not based solely on number of kills. I allocated approximately a thousand dollars to each of you for participation, therefore, for the portion actually reserved for payment based on performance, you received twice as much as everyone else, put together."
Faith stared at him, considering how many the SWAT team killed, then slowly released his shoulder and stepped ostentatiously aside. "You get to keep your head. This time."
"Thanks ever so much."
Faith slid past him.
"Wait a minute. If you didn't listen to the briefing, how did you choose which job you wanted to do?"
Faith didn't turn around. "This was the one that had 'kill demons' in it. Duh."
Author's Note: Writing boring walls of text is easy. Everything else, not so much. Now, the proper comparison for the payment calculation is Faith to the Brits, not the SWAT team, but she didn't quite catch that. Skilosh are demons we saw in Angel, unpleasant, but killed by gunshots. Comments/critiques are welcome. All typos must be slain.
Next Chapter: Very short. Faith listens. Mostly. And, oh, boy, is listening fun.