Disclaimer for whole story: I do not own anything to do with BtVS, not the characters nothing, zilch. So there, this is just a fanfiction. And ain't it obvious I don't own BtVS, otherwise why the hell would the show not still be on. I mean come ON! Ok so officially rambling but anyway…
Summary: Set after Chosen, S7 finale. Faith was left out of all the plans and everyone moved on with their lives, many wondered what she did after battling the first but none knew, there were rumours but never true sightings of the dark slayer. Now 5 years later she turns up and with a new big bad God from a hell dimension threatening to take over the world it is just as well. Can the past be kept in the past to ensure there is a future?
FEEDBACK: please review and give me feedback, I love it when you do…hint hint…
Note; THANKS to all of you that have reviewed, I love it when I get feedback from my stories, so thanks I really appreciate it.
Note #2: I decided on pairings but I'm not telling yet, it's a secret…
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Cruciatus
By Audiodream
6. Messages
WILLOW:
Kennedy had been gone hours and Willow was starting to worry for her girlfriend. Sometimes her mouth could get her into trouble, even when she didn't mean it. Like earlier today, with Faith. Although that time Willow wasn't sure whether or not she meant to be mean to the older slayer. Sure with this new prophecy times were tough and all but normally they weren't at each others throats like that.
For the past week or so since Angel arrived with the news of a prophecy all they seemed to be doing was researching. Sure normally Willow was all for research, researching prophecies, demons, sometimes spells, but after a week of doing it and all you have got for it was an illustration of a mark that people got once they visited the Cruciatus dimension it seemed to put a downer on the group. Even Angel and Giles seemed to be openly bored most of the time when reading and rereading ancient texts.
Faith had actually joined them after Kennedy left to help out with the research, it seemed perhaps something Kennedy had said to her had made her want to help. Perhaps, or she was just bored and didn't have anything better to do, and since everyone she knew was researching she thought why not.
Dawn, after having dinner with the group on the short break from research, had decided to help out too. She started by rereading the prophecy text, and then going through the book with the symbol in it. Dawn actually seemed genuinely interested in the prophecy. Willow was brought from her musings when Angel clapped his hands together. Everyone turned their attention to him.
"Right, as we aren't finding anything new I thought it was best if we were to review what we do know, encase it makes us remember something we have overlooked whilst reading? Anyway, so what do we know?" He asked looking around the table.
"This fuss is all about some prophecy that most likely won't come true, and it's about some demon gods called Repartidor and Electus." Faith said in a tone that made it clear to everyone she thought this was a waste of time.
"Yep, but remember we aren't sure which is good and which is bad, also whether or not both of them are actually demon gods from this dimension." Giles corrected.
"They battle sometime in the future, one or both end up dead. They battle to keep our world, Humus, safe. One wants to keep it the way it is the other wants to allow their people to come through the portal and….eat us all?" Buffy told them. They all nodded accepting her input. She smiled, obviously grateful it hadn't been questioned.
"OH, oh I know. It's all about this hell dimension Cruciatus, and this symbol. Oh and I found out the meaning of the symbol: see here, the outer ring symbolises the eternal lasting of their suffering and service to the God Crutio, who rules Cruciatus. Then the next ring, just inside of that one symbolises the magic of the portal Foreman. Then inside the pentagram is the face of Crutio, the god that was first banished there and now runs things there. He burns his army, slaves and prisoners with his mark. Anyone really, whether he likes them or not, to show them they belong to him." Dawn said excitedly as she told everyone the meaning of the symbol, from a book she had been reading. She passed the book around, showing everyone a clearer diagram of the symbol. Something out of the corner of her eye caught her attention, she turned fully and stopped at what she saw.
There on the front lawn, was Kennedy, her Kennedy, on all fours panting for breath and all bloodied and bruised. She got up immediately, ignoring the stares she received when her chair scrapped across the slate floor.
"Oh Goddess." She sighed and made a dash for the door leading to the front lawn, and therefore her girlfriend. She barely noted that they were all following her outside. Angel carried her battered girlfriend inside, and set her on the large coach in the living room. Immediately Willow was by her side, holding her hand, lending her strength to get better faster, and muttering a healing spell under her breathe.
"Are you all right sweetie? What happened?" She asked, concern filling her every bone. Somehow, somewhere she had fallen deeply in love with the tough potential slayer, turned slayer. Kennedy glanced around at the others and then back at her, then before speaking returned her gaze to Buffy.
"I was on my way home when this demon jumped me, he was strong, really strong. I couldn't take him on my own. He beat me real good then when I was down told me he wouldn't kill me 'cause he wanted me to take a message to the slayer, which I presume is you Buffy." Kennedy paused waiting for Buffy's reaction. When she nodded her girlfriend continued. "He told me to tell you that he was Repartidor, warrior for Crutio and his army. I got to tell you that you have spent many years in his world, killing his people and now it's their turn. That he will kill you and use your blood to open the portal. That's all he said." Kennedy said and then her eyes fluttered closed, into a peaceful slumber, hopefully, whilst her healing took effect. Everyone was silent for a moment, until Willow heard Faith mutter to Angel about wanting to talk to him and they left the room. Buffy sighed, they were all on edge.
"So we know for definite the prophecy is into play, what with the appearance of Repartidor we gotta presume that this Electus is around somewhere too, huh?" Buffy broke the uncomfortable silence that had taken over the room again. Willow glanced around the room. Giles was stood against the doorframe, cleaning his glasses and deep in thought. Dawn had a more open look of…realisation, maybe? Willow briefly wondered what that was about before looking back at Buffy. She looked concerned and worried, probably about the impending doom.
"Maybe it's fair to say that you, Buff, are Electus. I mean the slayer normally plays some part in these prophecies, and it can't be a coincidence that Repartidor, the new big bad in town, comes and delivers a message to you." Through my girlfriend, Willow added silently clenching her jaw.
"That's what I was thinking, perhaps this portal is somewhat like the portal Glory was trying to open in Sunnydale, the blood of the Key, or slayer, was needed. Perhaps to make the spell strong enough to open the portal and remain open long enough for Crutio and his army to pass through it needs a means of power. For example slayer blood." Giles gave his input. "Yes, that's what it must be. I'll get researching straight away." He said and with the left the living room mumbling to himself. "Why I never thought of this before is beyond me? Rupert, you old chap." Buffy raised an eyebrow at her watchers antics. But the affection was clear on her face.
Since the battle with the first and the destruction of Sunnydale so many things had changed. Xander was off somewhere in Africa, not here in San Francisco part of the Scooby gang. Sometimes Willow missed the old days when it was just three high school students and an older English librarian trying to save the people of Sunnydale, and sometimes averting an apocalypse. Now though, since the spell she had cast there were hundreds of slayers throughout the world, a whole new council and seven academies around the globe. The battle against evil was still difficult but now they were more prepared and they had a lot more resources and people offering their help.
Of course in the beginning it had been difficult, no one knew the consequence of going against the natural slayer line, girls everywhere that had potential were given the power. At first there were five year olds going around breaking all of their toys, and with a whole lot of energy. Willow, with a lot of help from the coven and Giles had cast another spell controlling the power of the slayer. Now only girls at sixteen got the slayer power. For some reason no one older than Faith was called, but now that there were a lot more slayer hopefully many would survive until they are old and grey. As for locating all of these new slayers well the connection she felt with them helped a lot, she was able to do locator spells and had found most if not all of the active slayers in the world.
Willow turned her gaze back to her best friends, the worry was already setting
in. Soon sheer determination would take place on her features. Sometimes Willow just wished the gods would favour her and maybe she could be left alone to have a normal life, well as normal as a slayer could have. Why did all the prophecies have to be about Buffy? Now there were hundreds of others. And Faith, don't forget her. She was a natural slayer, how come no one ever wrote a prophecy about her. It was as if the world all ready knew there would be two slayers, but then how come everyone had been so surprised and judgemental. Some had even frowned upon it. Wasn't there safety in numbers. Anyway, Willow tore away from her deep thoughts and put all her attention on her battered and bruised girlfriend. Thoughts could be saved for later.
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FAITH:
'Stupid, Stupid, Stupid, Stupid, Stupid!' Was the mantra silently working it's way through the slayers brain. Why hadn't she put two and two together before and got four? Why was it just then in the research room that her eyes opened up? God she was so stupid. She took a calm breath and stopped pacing to face Angel, who had the perfect mask of indifference. She herself had a mask of indifference but his was perfect, it hardly ever broke.
"I don't think that message was meant for Buffy, I think it was meant for me." She said bluntly, whilst thinking 'Oh hell'. His mask slipped, she saw curiosity and surprised evident in his dark orbs.
"Why?" He simply asked. 'He's such a talker' She rolled her eyes mentally.
"Because…"
By the time she had finished telling him everything, his mask was gone and she felt tears stinging her eyes. She wouldn't cry, not now. Not again, she had cried over this once already, and that was enough. Even more embarrassing that B had caught her doing it.
"Faith, why didn't you tell anyone. We could have helped you." He said, and to her surprise pulling her into a hug. She stood stiffly in his embrace for a minute before relaxing and placing her arms tightly around his waist. They stayed like that for god knows how long in a comfortable silence. "How long?" Angel finally broke it, she stepped out of the embrace and looked up at him questioningly. "How long were you there? Here it was five years but I know from experience that time moves differently in hell dimensions." He explained his question. She looked at her shoes not able to look at him while she answered.
"Twenty-Five years give or take a few days. I tried to get back earlier but the portal wouldn't open. Angel this is all my fault, if I hadn't come back then-"
"Don't say that Faith, none of this is your fault. You were screwed over by the Powers that Be and you never should have had to go there in the first place." She looked at him and saw nothing but compassion and truth within them. He rarely let emotion into his brown orbs but it was there today. And she was thankful for that, ever since coming back into the real world all she had been feeling was detached and cold. "We need to tell the others Faith, not yet though. We'll wait until tomorrow, Kennedy will be better then and I think I need to do a little more research first." After seeing the look on her face he added. "I could tell it to them if you want." She nodded.
Tomorrow, tomorrow would be the day that the secret that she had been keeping for the past Five or twenty-five years of her life would be told to everyone close to her. She just hoped they were all as understanding as Angel.
She had just come back from twenty five years in a hell dimension, she didn't want to lose everyone that she cared about. It would be too much, too much to cope with after everything else. Coming back had been so difficult on her already, what with the dreams and memories of her time there.
Having spent twenty five years in a hell dimension fighting demons she had become stronger, physically and emotionally. She could tell when she was fighting how different it was. Before she was one raging hormone angry at the world for screwing her over before she had even started her life and lashing out on instinct. That was her fighting style, hit 'em hard and hope for the best. Now she fought with passion, but held her control, she was in charge of the fight. Mastering her moves, building her strength and anticipating her opponent moves. She had become a force to be reckoned with; she knew it only she wished she hadn't. She wished she wasn't part of some prophecy that could end in the end of the world or her own death. She was only twenty six years old, although had lived an extra twenty on top of that. She was still young but had seen much for her age, and why? Because the stupid powers that be came and told her that someone had to go to the hell dimension to stop a threat that was going to try and take over the world. They had said she would only be there for a year and then she would be able to open the portal and come home. Just under a year it had took her to stop the threat, killing all the demons in the faction. But then the day to come home had come and passed, the portal hadn't opened and she had to wait another twenty four years until it finally did.
And now tomorrow they would be telling all the others about her horrible time spent in a hell dimension all 'cos she was screwed over by the good guys; just like before. But she knew what she had to do before tomorrow, there was one person that deserved the truth from herself rather than Angel; Buffy.
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BUFFY:
Buffy sat at her desk in her large office angry, annoyed and concerned; all at the same time. Why? Why did there have to be another prophecy written about her, it made her so mad. Her life had always difficult, ever since becoming the slayer. There had always been something expected from her, but now there were hundreds of slayers, it had gotten easier over the past five years. Other people got to shoulder the responsibility but now it had been handed right back over to her.
The way Giles and Willow looked at her now, it was just like with the battle with the first. As if she was some kind of goddess about to create a miracle that would save them. She hated it. A soft knock interrupted her thoughts. She looked up from the spot on the wall she had been staring at and was surprised to find Faith there.
Since she had arrived so abruptly they hadn't really had time to talk, no one knew what had happened to her to get those injuries. Buffy smiled at her and Faith stepped into the room, she looked nervous but returned the smile. Buffy didn't have to be a slayer to hear the deep breath she took as she stepped into the room.
"Hey, what's up?" Buffy asked trying to make the younger slayer more at ease with talking to her. It didn't work.
"I wanted to…talk…with you." She said hesitantly as if she was expecting herself to change her mind. Buffy just nodded her head and pointed to the free seat in front of the desk. Faith looked at it as if it was hell itself. "Not here, maybe we could um take a walk around the grounds or somethin'." Faith asked looked a little pleadingly. Faith was setting her on edge somewhat, when had Faith ever behaved like this? It must be serious; she concluded.
"Ok, it will be good to walk around a bit, ever since the attack on Kennedy I've been stuck here researching and doing paperwork. Damn apocalypses." She says trying to get the tense Faith to relax a bit.
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Once they were outside, they stood side by side and Buffy couldn't help but glance at Faith every so now and then. So far she hadn't said another word, and Buffy was eager to give her time, this was obviously difficult for Faith and Buffy really didn't want her to shut down.
That had been what Faith had done ever since she had met her all those years ago in the back alley behind the bronze. Walls, she had thrived on them. She had them all around her, Faith's mind and emotions were hidden from everyone behind these huge unbreakable barriers that she had put up around herself, and most probably with the help of several people that had hurt her along the way.
Buffy hated those nameless people, the people or the events that had made Faith feel like she had to isolate herself, protect herself from the world. The snippets of the Faith she had seen when the walls and barriers had been marginally cracked for a moment in time had been good. She had wanted to get to know Faith.
In the beginning, back in Sunnydale she had felt threatened by Faith's presence at first. She knew what it was like to be a slayer, to have the hardship of shouldering the responsibility. But then that threat turned to resentment when the scooby gang still looked to her for the answers and left Faith to do as she pleased. Now she realised she never should have excluded Faith, it hadn't been her asking her to do extra training, extra research, extra school work.
No, everyone else had expected something of her. Her mother: to be the responsible daughter. Willow: to be the perfect best friend. Giles: to be the best most dedicated slayer. They all expected her to be there twenty-four seven and to save the day. Faith hadn't. She came to Sunnydale with no expectations, well only one. To be herself; the slayer with the double H's. But she had denied it, hid herself. Never had she admitted what slaying did to her. Never.
That must have killed Faith, to come to Sunnydale looking for the only other girl in the world who is meant to understand how being a slayer is and you get her. Telling you constantly that what she is saying makes her uncomfortable, that she still is all by herself, that she doesn't understand. Even if she did.
"So what did you want to talk about?"
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FAITH:
Walking around the grounds of the academy with a silent B next to her gave her time to think about what she was going to say. How did you tell someone that in fact she hadn't been loafing around America for the past five years, but in actual fact she had been soaring through a hell dimension killing all the demons she could find for the past twenty-five? The answer: there was no easy way.
There never was for her, she found herself suddenly silently cursing the PtB. Why was her life so hard? Why did they have to always screw her over? Couldn't they just give her a break, once? In Boston, In Sunnydale, In LA, In the past five years? If she thought about it it was a long time overdue. Things had never been easy she just wished this one thing was. She didn't really care about all the other stuff, that had mostly all been her fault in some way.
Sunnydale had been one mess up after another. Not telling the gang straight away about Kakistos, letting herself screw around, being so irresponsible. Killing Finch, and then that whole deal with the Mayor. She had to be insane. It was all her fault, that night Buffy was finally accepting her so she thought maybe she would finally admit that slaying drove her crazy, that she also had a wild side. That it wasn't just her being a mess up. Then she had to do what she was famous for ruining everything, she killed an innocent. Someone she was meant to protect, her whole calling, what made her special had been disrupted. How could she trust herself to go out there again to slay vamps and not go out of control again? She didn't think she could so she did what she could, she panicked.
She never meant to hurt anyone, but she was lost and her barriers were cracking a little bit each day but no one was there to see her apart from the grimy cracked tiles on the shower wall as she pathetically broke down. Then there was the mayor, treating her so special, like her own father had done before he had enough of her mother and left her with the dragon. So she did anything he said, believed it. Thought she had found someone to actually care about her, but then she found it…the document detailing the partnership between the mayor and Kakistos. How they had plotted to kill the slayer in Boston so that the side of good had even less help, and how it had gone wrong and only her watcher was killed.
Her world had fell apart after reading that, for a while she was numb just playing along until she found a way to fix it. But of course that mucked up as well, but it still ended the way she mostly wanted it to.
"So what did you want to talk about?" Her voice comes thickly through the chilling night air.
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TBC…
FEEDBACK: I much appreciate reviews so…REVIEW, tell me what you thought, do you think this story has the potential to be good? Like is said tell me what you thought.
Note; thanks to all of you that have reviewed, I love it when I get feedback from my stories, so thanks I really appreciate it.
