A/N: For those recently finding this little piece of work, welcome! For those returning, I thank you for your patience for the very long delay. For months, I was stuck...so a huge thanks to my muse for getting me into Faith and Xander's head to break my out of my writer's block. This was part of a 7, 000 word chapter so I broke it into two chapters. Next one will be up very soon!


As the dust from the third vamp drifted to the slimy concrete ground, Faith pursed her lips and exhaled. The first two vamps had been mere fledges and dusted with barely a poke of her trusty stake but the third...well, the third had been a scrappy one. His frame was lean and light and she judged him to be in his early twenties. She'd thought he would dust as easily as his counterparts, but from the first hit he'd proven to be surprisingly agile – leaping from the floor as if there were springs beneath his feet, somersaulting easily over her head and able to duck away from her most brutal hits.

Had Buffy been with her, the fight might have been more fun, but the blonde Slayer wasn't due to arrive back at the mansion until just before noon the next day (or later this day depending on the point of view). The entire time Faith fought the vamp he spoke a never-ending string of unintelligible words, warm brown eyes sparkling with amusement. From the sarcastic tone of his voice, Faith assumed he was taunting her or hurling insults in a foreign language. Eastern European, she thought, Russian, Bulgarian or Polish were her most (un)educated guesses. To amuse herself, after she lost track of how long they had been fighting, she faux-translated what she imagined he said and responded with random eastern European words of her own.

Childish, perhaps, but it passed the time.

"You are much too fast for me, but it is nice that you let me have false hope that I will walk away from this fight as a winner." The vamp smirked after he dodged a front kick to the stomach.

"Pirogi!" she responded as she hit him in the chin with her right elbow.

"I am Tarzan, you Jane." he taunted as he bounced backwards into a double (triple?) somersault - this dude had some mad skills in the gymnastics department.

"Mikhail Baryshnikov!" she retorted as she cartwheeled forward, her foot clipping him on his left shoulder.

"I will avenge the deaths of my brethren!" he declared when he squatted and swept his leg parallel to the ground.

"Borsht." She chuckled as she jumped easily over his leg. Annoyed he brought out his game face.

"I vant to suck your blood." He jeered as he swiped his hand toward her shoulder, fingers splayed like claws.

"Bucharest." She dared him when she dodged the blow. He stumbled and she took advantage of the moment and pushed him forcefully into a wall.

"You. Hit. Like. A. Girl." He panted as she hit him with a right cross-left cross-right cross-left cross combo.

"Spasibo." She countered when her stake pushed through his chest and he exploded in dust, slightly out of breath from her efforts. It was a shame, really, the kid could have a good future as an acrobat working in one of those pretentious Cirque du Solei shows she had once seen advertised on her way through Vegas.

The fight triggered the oh-so familiar buzz that left her feeling antsy and dissatisfied. Unfortunately, the rest of her patrol was uneventful, demon-wise at least. She spent her final hour completing a thorough search of an annex in one of the abandoned subway tunnels, but got nothing more than a few sticky cobwebs in her hair and something unspeakably slimy (and smelly) stuck to the bottom of her shoe.

Later, she leaned back in the limo's leather seat and looked through the tinted windows. Despite the late hour, there were enough people spilling from the variety of bars and clubs that the traffic was sluggish.
One couple, for no particular reason other than they were in her line of sight, caught her attention. They were ambling slowly along the sidewalk, fingers tangled together and exchanging shy glances. Something about them just screamed 'first date' despite the late hour. A gust of wind must have blown a strand of hair across the female's face. Just as she reached up to move it away, the young man gently pushed her wrist down and then carefully moved the strand off the woman's face. The look on the young woman's face was a combination of expectant and hopeful.

A year ago, she would have been callously cruel in her observation of the couple, and would have described their interaction with words like "simple", "weak" and "pathetic". Back then she felt nothing but contempt for the humans she was supposed to protect. Now, she understood that it wasn't contempt she had felt all those years. It was (bitterness. disappointment. longing) envy. Always the outsider, Faith didn't get the loving mother, the camaraderie of close friends, the first date…

The light changed and the town car moved forward while the man put one finger under the woman's chin and lifted it as he inclined his head downward. Before their lips touched, Faith looked away, an ache in her chest and blinking rapidly at the unexpected moisture in her eyes.

The traffic thinned and the car began to pick up speed as it left the city and headed toward the estate.

(There had been a moment, once upon a time. Laying in the dark with him, fingers entwined, her head on his chest, his heart beating a rapid tattoo against her ear. A trembling hand gently brushing her hair behind her ear and whispering "I never knew it would be like this…" and she remembered thinking how innocent he seemed and how difficult was to prove to him that girls like her didn't belong with guys like him.)

She didn't notice they had reached their destination until the car stopped moving and Joe opened the passenger door.

The windows in the mansion were dark, the hour too late (or too early, depending on one's point of view) for people to be moving about. Inattentively, she nodded a farewell to the chauffeur and veered to the left to walk along one of the lit paths. When the path split in two, she went right, toward the pool. Deep inside, she could still feel it, that antsy, restless sensation she always felt after a fight. A swim, she decided, is just what she needed. Her stomach growled, reminded her that she hadn't eaten since earlier that evening. A swim, she amended, followed by some more of that decadent coconut cloud cake that the cook had served after dinner.

A decorative hedge separated the pool house from the path. Just before she turned through the archway she began to unbutton her snug leather vest. At the sound of running water being turned off, she paused, her fingers toying with the final button near her waist. Curious, she turned into the archway and then stilled.


In high school, he had recurring dreams where he was a soldier. Ever since that one Halloween, it happened sometimes. Occasionally, he dreamed about war-torn countries and bombs exploding; other times he was marching with his platoon through the humid jungle, sweat steadily soaking through the thin material of his undershirt and stinging his eye(s); once he dreamed of standing guard during a frigid night. After he graduated, those dreams had stopped, with only an occasional reappearance.

After the battle with the First, they had returned, but with a twist. He still navigated around exploding bombs, tramped through tropical jungles and stood guard during an icy night but in these dreams, he knew his mission. Save. Rescue. Protect.

He never saw (who) what he was meant to protect, but deep down he knew these dreams were a subconscious manifestation of his guilt over Anya's death.

In…two three four. Out…two three four. In…two three four. Out…two three four.

Xander had repeated his mantra so many times he had lost count. His mind was pleasantly blank, his only thought on the next breath of air, the next drag of his arm through the cool pool water and the fluttering of his legs propelling him forward.

When his muscles began to tremble, he followed the pattern he had set over the last few months and pushed himself for one final lap. When the lap was complete, too tired to pull himself up and out of the water, he rolled onto his back and floated near the edge of the pool. He remembered his first experience in water outside of the bathtub. Jessie had moved to Sunnydale in the second grade and it wasn't long before he joined Xander and Willow's little group of outsiders.

One hot July day, Jessie's mother took the trio to the beach. Xander can still recall the heat of the sand on the soles of his feet, the smell of the salty air and that first dip of his toe in the warm Pacific water. It was a sad truth, from the very beginning he felt more comfortable in the water than he did in his parent's home. It was the beginning of many trips to beach chaperoned by Jessie's mom. Her large floral patterned beach bag overflowed with snacks, beverages, towels and other necessities. After she thoroughly coated them with sunscreen, she waved them toward the water and settled against one of the many pieces of driftwood scattered across the sand to read whichever novel caught her fancy.

Willow and Jessie were happy enough to splash at each other in the shallow waters and creating "masterpieces" in the sand, while over the course of the summer (and the summers that followed) Xander progressed from a dog paddle to side stroke and then to front stroke.

When they were freshman, Willow encouraged him to try out for the swim team, but a push from his father caused him to fall and fracture in his femur. (He told everyone that he wiped out on his bicycle but he could tell Willow and Jessie suspected the truth.) By the time his leg had healed, the team had been formed and it was too late.

After graduation, Xander rarely found the time to swim. He hadn't realized just how much he missed until his first morning after arriving at Kennedy's home. That evening, he waited impatiently for his companions to retire. When the house was quiet, he grabbed a towel and swim trunks and furtively made his way to the pool. The pool had underwater lights that cast a bluish tint through the water and parts of the deck. In a darkened corner, he stripped and changed into his shorts, his fingers hovering uncertainly before he removed his eyepatch.

At the edge of the pool's deep end, he paused, losing track of the time as he hovered at the edge, his eye scanning the surface of the pool and his heart pounding with something that was part excitement and part (dread) uncertainty. For a moment, his mind conjured an image of his lifeless, one-eyed body being found by a gaggle of Slayerettes the next morning.

"What are you waiting for, Harris?" he had whispered to himself. He flexed his toes and bounced slightly on the balls of his feet, arms raised in preparation for his first dive, took a deep breath and…did nothing. With a long, slow exhale, he relaxed his arms and lowered his body until he was sitting on the edge, feet dangling in the water.

With his palms curling around the beveled edge of the pool, he slowly lowered his body into the water. Gently, he used his hand to push away from the edge and drifted for a few moments before treading water. Lacking the depth perception that two-eyed people took for granted, the pool looked (and felt) bottomless. Taking a deep breath, he stopped treading and let gravity pull his body downward, silently counting in his head until his feet touched the bottom of the pool and opened his eye.

The water was so clear, he could see the where the bottom of the pool gave a sharp incline, but he was unable to judge the distance. He extended his arms above his head, palms touching. Once his toes pushed him upward, he turned his palms outward and brought them down to his sides to propel his body toward the water's surface. Slowly, he did a few laps, counting the strokes. Two laps became twenty and then he lost count…

After that night, he waited until he thought everyone was asleep, then made his way to the pool. He swam until the ache in his arms became a burn and his mind gloriously blank.

Now, looking at the deep indigo sky, it occurred to Xander that his abusive father probably saved him from turning into a creature from the black lagoon. Had he joined the swim team in his freshman year, he would have been one of the guys inhaling the swim coach's special concoction that turned the team into something akin to a creature from the black lagoon.

He lay on his back for another moment and then rolled toward to side of the pool. He placed his palms on the ledge and pushed his body up from the water. Rolling his head from side to side, he walked to outdoor shower beside the pool house and rinsed the chlorine from his body. A few minutes later, his eyepatch dangling from his fingers and a long pool towel slung over his right shoulder, he walked through the archway and smacked into…

"Faith."

"Xander."

For a moment neither moved. Then, inwardly cursing, Xander lifted the eyepatch to his face and tied the leather cords at the back of his head.

"Bit late, isn't it?" he cringed at the faint note of accusation in his voice, but he couldn't help it. He hated feeling so (exposed. vulnerable) out of his depth, but it wasn't an uncommon reaction for him whenever he was in her presence.

"Or early, depending on how you look at it."

"Yeah," he shuffled to the left then continued, "you can…" his voice trailed off and he flailed his arm in the direction of the pool.

Faith didn't move and he really needed to be going.

"So, I'll just…" he used his thumb and index finger to indicate his intended direction before walking away. He was halfway down the path when he heard her diving into the water. He was almost in his room when he realized Faith wasn't carrying a swimsuit on her way to the pool. Later, when he slept, his dreams were a jumble mixture of memories where he lay in bed and held a dozing Faith protectively in his arms while another Faith stood to the side and sneered that he was a fool.

TBC