Disclaimer: I do not own either Buffy or Angel; they both belong to the fabulous Joss Whedon.

A/N: Bit of a fun short chapter here. Thanks for the reviews.

"No." Faith said as Cordy held out a black strapless dress. "No!" she cried when the cheerleader's expression appeared unrelenting.

"Come on, Faith, you'll look great," Dawn pleaded.

"Yeah," Buffy agreed doing a twirl in front of the mirror, her violet dress fanning out around her. "Just, not as great as me."

Faith poked her tongue out at her in reply, something that the blonde returned wholeheartedly. Cordy rolled her eyes and handed the dress to Faith.

"No way you're greater than me," Dawn muttered.

"Little bit," Buffy replied with a smile.

"Try it on," Cordelia ordered, spinning Faith around to face the changing rooms

"Hell no. There is no way I'm wearing a dress."

"Oh, but Faith, you'll look so sweet," Willow protested, pulling a green dress off the rack. "Well, OK, maybe 'sweet' wasn't the best word to use but you get what I mean," she added, seeing the looks on everyone's faces.

"I'm not wearing it," the brunette said with finality.

"Faith, have you ever worn a dress before?" the redhead asked.

"Wow, aren't you a vision?"

An image flashed in Faith's mind of herself in a pink and white dress that made her want to gag.

Faith shook her head to clear the image.

Willow, taking this the wrong way, said, "See, if you haven't worn one before how can you know it's as bad as you say it is? Have you ever worn a skirt before?"



"Yes!" Buffy and Dawn cried simultaneously before the brunette could even think of opening her mouth.

"There was that time at Christmas in senior year. You were all dressed up when you came over to my place, skirt an' all," the slayer said, looking quite proud of herself for remembering.

Faith scowled and handed the dress back to Cordy. "No."

"Look, just try it on, doesn't mean you have to actually wear it."

After a pause the brunette sighed in defeat and headed towards the change room. "You owe me."

Cordy turned to Buffy and the two shared a high-five while Dawn did a little victory dance in the corner. Kennedy just rolled her eyes and turned to her girlfriend who was sharing a triumphant smile with Fred. Dawn was so enthused in her dance that she didn't see the table to her left and tripped over it, falling face first into the ground.

"I'm OK," the teen gasped, jumping to her feet. Everyone else rolled their eyes. "Just a slight fracture, I'll be fine." Dawn rubbed her sore arm with a wince. "On second thoughts: Buffy, can you slay the table?"

"Why does Buffy have to slay a table?" Came Faith's amused voice.

"Dawn tripped over one, it was very funny," the blonde told her.

Said girl scowled and walked off to go search for a dress.

Willow giggled. "I think you made her angry."

"I'm her sister, it's my job," the slayer replied simply, taking a stunning red dress off the rack and holding it up beside her. "What'd yah think: red or purple?"

The four women looked at her thoughtfully. Finally Cordelia spoke. "Neither. Give the red to Fred and the purple to Kennedy and try this one on." She walked over to a beautiful white dress in the far corner and picked it up, handing it to the blonde.

"I don't know, purple ain't exactly my colour," Kennedy mumbled taking the dress off Buffy.

"Just try it on!" Cordy ordered.

Kennedy rolled her eyes and walked off, Fred scurrying after her. Buffy took one look at Cordy's fiery expression and followed after them. That done the brunette turned to Willow.

"I choose this," the redhead said quickly, nodding down to the dress in her hands.

An unbothered Dawn came waltzing into the room, a cobalt dress in hand. "What do you think? She asked brightly, holding up the dress so the ex-cheerleader could see.

"Perfect," Cordelia said with a smile before pulling out a check list and a pen. "Faith: maybe, Buffy: maybe, Willow: check, Kennedy: maybe, Dawn: check, Fred-"

"Check!" shouted the Texan from inside her stall.



Cordy smiled in delight. "Fred: check," she said, ticking off her name.

"Uh, what about you Cordy?" Willow asked, eyeing the brunette nervously.

"Hmm? Oh I was thinking that gold dress over there." She suddenly frowned. "Faith, what's taking you so long?"

"You try gettin' out of skin tight leather!"

"No thank you," Cordy replied. "And besides, I know that's just a smoke screen. I bet you're already dressed and just don't wanna come out."

"Your point?" Was the only reply.

"Come on, Faith, it can't be that bad," Dawn said, trying to hide a smile.

"Yes," the slayer said, suddenly appearing. "It can."

"Wow, Faith you look..." Willow began.

"Bad, cute, wrong, ugly, something along those lines?"

"Actually, I was gonna say brilliant, but if you insist."

Faith's nose wrinkled in disgust. "It's a dress."

"We did notice that, yeah" Cordy replied with a roll of her eyes.

"I'm not wearing it."

"You'll wear what we say you wear," she replied.

"No."

"Yes."

"No!

"Yes!

"NO!"

"If you don't then that video of you singing back at the Hyperion will have its own little screening in front of everyone at the party," Cordelia told her, with a look that clearly said, 'beat that'.

Faith sucked in a breath, eyes wide. "You wouldn't."

"Oh I would."

Faith growled in frustration before stalking off towards the change room to go change. Buffy, who was just coming out, quickly made way for her. The blonde watched her go with raised eyebrows before turning and making her way towards the others.



"What's her problem?" she asked.

"Cordy blackmailed her to wear the dress to the party," Dawn told her nonchalantly.

"'Blackmailed' is such a strong word, I prefer convinced," the brunette said.

Buffy raised an eyebrow. "What'd you do?"

"I said that I'd show a tape of her singing to everyone at the party if she didn't wear the dress," she replied simply.

"Tape? Singing?" Kennedy asked, coming over to them in a nice purple dress.

Cordelia laughs at the memory. "Yeah . . . See, what happened is-"

"Don't even think about it C!" Faith warned.

Cordelia rolled her eyes. "As I was saying-"

"Cordelia, if you tell them you'll wish you'd never been born," Faith said, suddenly appearing dressed in her usual leather.

The seer contemplated this for a moment before letting out a sigh and giving in. "Oh, alright . . . Hey, you never told me what Lorne said after reading you."

The slayer shifted uncomfortably. "He said he didn't see anything. Something was blocking him."

Cordy's eyes widened, how come nobody had told her this? "Faith, are you sure? 'Cause that's not a good sign."

The brunette sighed. "Yeah, I'm sure. He's got a bunch of theories about why, but you'll have to ask him."

Cordelia nodded, feeling slightly unnerved.

"Um, what are you talking about?" Buffy asked with a look of confusion similar to almost everyone in the room.

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Dawn looked up from her ice-cream at the brunette sitting across from her. The rest of the girls had gone off to do more shopping, Dawn would've gone with them too but had felt that someone needed to stay behind and keep Faith, who had quickly declined, company. And that company involved pigging out on frozen goodies at an ice-cream shop.

"So, will you go out with Angel?" the youngest Summers asked bluntly.

Faith, who had just taken a sip from her soda, choked in surprise.



"What?" she gasped, finally getting her choking under control.

"Will. You. Go. Out. With . Angel," Dawn repeated slowly, as though talking to someone of little intelligence.

"Dawn for starters: I don't date. And even if I did date there's no way I'd do it with a vampire."

"Buffy did."

"I'm not Buffy!"

Dawn was taken aback by the fierceness in the slayer's eyes; clearly this was a touchy subject. "OK, OK . . . Anyway, it's not like he's evil or anything, he has a soul."

Faith's eyes darkened. "Having a soul doesn't make you good." She'd learnt that one the hard way.

"Sure it does. When Angel has a soul he's good, when he doesn't he's bad."

"No, it doesn't. A soul doesn't make you good, it just makes you who you are," she told her.

Seeing the confused look on the teen's face Faith continued.

"Put it this way, there are two parts to every vampire –The demon and the soul. Take Angel for example: Angelus is the demon, Liam is the soul. The only reason Angel is good when he has a soul is because Liam isn't bad."

Dawn pondered her words, surprised that they actually made sense. "But, what about Spike? If the demon and the soul are two different things then how come they both loved Buffy? How come they both had pretty much the same personality?"

"Way I see it, Spike can't love anyone, only Liam can."

"But Spike loved Buffy, he went and got a soul for her," Dawn protested.

"Spike didn't love Buffy, Spike didn't love Drusilla, William did." Dawn sent her a confused look. "How do I explain this? See, I reckon William was always inside of Spike, giving him the humanity that you guys saw in him. Giving him the ability to love. When Spike went and got a soul, over the years the two had become so similar that when William was fully awakened in his body they became the one person . . . That's just what I think anyway. 'S not like I've actually met Spike or anything. Have I met Spike?"

Dawn nodded. "And, I think, you might be right. How long have you been thinking about the whole meaning-of-souls thing anyhow?"

Faith shifted uncomfortably. "Since I was kid actually. I kept wondering why if people were supposed to have souls or consciences or whatever you wanna call it and they were supposed to make you good, then how come they didn't. At least not where I was from anyhow."

There was a pause in which the younger brunette debated about whether to ask the slayer about her home-life. It was something that was quickly shot down by the reminder of how defensive Faith 

was. No, better to just leave those questions for Buffy or Angel, maybe Giles. Dawn grinned evilly to herself, Not like Faith was gonna kill them for asking or anything.

"Yeah . . . Um, you do realize that you haven't said a thing about not going out with Angel because you don't like him."

The brunette gave the teen a light punch on the arm.

"Ow," Dawn said, rubbing said arm. "Well, you didn't."

"Not my type, D," but despite her words there was a slight smile on the older woman's face. Dawn smiled too.

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"We're back," Buffy called, stepping into the house along with the rest of the girls.

"Oh thank god," Giles sighed, appearing out of nowhere.

"What happened?" the blonde asked, trying to keep back a smile.

"Don't even get me started," the British man said. "Honestly, I thought it would be the party that caused the trouble but, apparently not."

"Again I ask question."

"I mean, they didn't even think to inform me," he continued, apparently oblivious to the fact she had spoken. "Something of this magnitude, and no-one bothered to tell me. Now does that sound right to you?"

"Well if I actually knew what you were talking about..." the slayer trailed off, raising an eyebrow.

Before Giles could answer they were interrupted by a loud crash from the other room. Everyone shared a look before running in the direction of the sound.

"..No seriously, I mean it, how was your holiday?" Angel asked, getting up from his sprawled position on the ground.

A teenage boy with brown hair sneered, getting into a fighting stance. "Great," he said, landing a punch on the side of Angel's face. "No vampires at all." he kicked him in the gut. "Well, at least none with souls."

Angel smiled. "Wonderful," he said, before knocking the boy into the wall. "Good to know you had a great time."

"Yeah, it was brilliant," he replied, executing a sharp right hook.



Everyone watched the performance in shock, everyone that is except Cordelia. Whose eyes were trained on her nails, seemingly unbothered. "Men," she muttered, as if this were an everyday occurrence.

"Hey, watch the good china!" Willow squealed as Angel was thrown into the wall, mere millimetres away from a cabinet that seemed to have very expensive things in it.

Cordy heaved an exaggerated sigh. "Oh I give up . . . Connor you stop that this instant!"

The boy came to screeching halt and turned around to face the seer, a sheepish look on his face. "Sorry Cordy."

Cordelia turned her scorching gaze on Angel who was busy picking himself off the floor. "Sorry Cordy," he mimicked once he was on two feet, hanging his head in shame.

"Why we didn't just call you in the first place is beyond me," Giles muttered as Andrew appeared from his hiding place behind a bench.

The kitchen was looking very much trashed.

"We weren't hiding, absolutely no hiding here," Xander announced as he and Oz walked out of the pantry.

Oz raised an eyebrow at him. "Yet the resemblance is striking."

Xander elbowed him. "I'm trying to defend our manliness here."

Oz remained calm. "A real man always knows when to hide."

"This was the trouble you were talking about?" Buffy asked, turning to the watcher.

"Part of it yes."

"Who's the kid?" Kennedy asked.

"I'm not a kid!" Connor exclaimed automatically.

"The kid has a name."

"Connor."

"Sure you are," Fred said brightly.

"If he's a kid then I'm a kid, and that's just . . . wrong," Dawn piped up.

"Deal with it, kid," Faith said, showing no sign of her earlier a-memory-but-maybe-not-a-memory-thingy (as she'd dubbed it).

The youngest Summers pouted adorably but didn't say anything more.



Kennedy was starting to look nervous. "Twenty means you're not a kid right?"

Faith snorted. "God I hope so."

"So, not to be rude or anything but, who are you?" Buffy asked Connor.

Many of the room's occupants looked like they wished they could be anywhere but there, clearly they weren't too happy with revealing to the blonde slayer that the love of her life had had a child with someone else.

"Connor is Angel's son," Faith told her, seeing as no-one else was going to do it.

The brunette had to stifle a laugh at the comical look on the other slayer's face.

"That's it. You. Me. Other room. Now," Buffy ordered, pointing to each thing in term and exiting the room.

Angel, looking like hell would be a trip in Hawaii right now, followed after her, doing a rather impressive walk of shame.

"I still can't believe no-one bothered to inform me that two vampires had succeeded in creating life," Giles muttered, only to be ignored by pretty much everyone in the room.

"Faith," Connor said happily as his eyes fell on her. "It's good to see you again."

"I'd like to say the same but I can't exactly remember you."

"Oh I know, Angel told me," he said with a warm smile.

"You got all that out in-between punching and kicking?" Cordelia asked surprised.

Connor nodded, looking quite proud of himself before turning back to the slayer. "Anyway, It's great to see you, and, if you need any help trying to get your memory back just ask."

Faith nodded trying hard to hide an amused smile.

"Oh, this is ridiculous. He's just like his father. Not only are the fighting moves, the sneer and the forehead thingy genetic but he also has the same taste in women," Dawn commented, looking annoyed.

"'Same taste in women?'" many echoed simultaneously.

"Hey, wouldn't it be funny if he started making moon-eyes at Buffy," Willow said with a smile.

"Hey, 'him' standing right here," Connor announced.

"Besides, it's not like that's the only woman Angel has eyes for," Dawn said, casting a discreet glance at Faith who gave her a sharp poke in return.

"What do you mean?" Xander asked.



"Oh nothing," the teen told him with a smile.

"Don't worry about it Xan, she's delusional," Faith assured him, swinging an arm around Dawn's shoulders and smiling in a mix of amusement and fondness for the girl's persistence.