"...If you don't come in after me, I might die." Faith said before tapping her hand dramatically to her chest and jumping into the sewer that the vampires had disappeared into only moments ago.
Buffy stood for barely a breath before jumping in after her slaying partner. She braced herself for the landing that she knew would be coming at any moment. When it didn't come as quickly as she expected, she started to panic and was not at all prepared when she finally did hit the ground.
Her knees buckled, and she fell to all fours. Shocked when her hands and knees were not on the hard, wet surface of a sewer. Instead, all she could feel was sand. And in place of a dark, damp sewer tunnel above her head, there was only a clear blue sky that went on for further in all directions than she could even begin to comprehend.
As she stood and took in her very un-sewerlike surroundings - rage began to bubble up inside her. Turning around to find the cause of her fury - she saw the other slayer sitting in the sand a few feet away.
"Faith!" She took a menacing step towards Faith. Her fists clenched into tight balls at her side.
"What!?" Faith turned to her - echoing her challenging tone.
Buffy took a moment to actually look at Faith and see the emotions playing over her face. That same look of defeat masked by anger that had been there only weeks before - when the evil Mrs. Post had come to town and very nearly succeeded in driving a wedge between them.
Instead of yelling at Faith, which was definitely her original plan, she took a careful 360-degree sweep of their surroundings. Taking calm, centering breaths while trying to keep the rage she was feeling under control. "Where do you think we are?"
"I don't have a fucking clue. Just 'cause this is all my fault - doesn't mean I know what happened, or where the fuck we are!" Faith huffed and kicked at the sand as she stood up.
"I didn't think you knew. I just wondered if you had any ideas." Buffy was beginning to rethink her plan to not yell at Faith. It would be so easy to fall into fighting with the confrontational slayer.
"Of course you didn't think I knew - 'cause I'm an idiot, right? A dumbass that jumps into things without thinking? What could I possibly know about anything?!" Faith wasn't at all responding to Buffy's attempts to be calm and was stalking closer.
"No! That's not what I meant, and I don't think you're an idiot." Buffy wanted to take a step back, to show herself as non-threatening, but she just couldn't bring herself to do that. If Faith wanted to fight, Buffy wasn't going to cower in fear.
"Right, B. Sure, you don't." Faith stopped her approach and crossed her arms over her chest.
Buffy shook her head and tried to find some inner peace. "I don't." Recently, Buffy had been thinking she should try to emulate Faith's carefree attitude a little more, but at this moment, she couldn't think of any reason why she thought that was a good idea.
Faith scoffed and turned away, stuffing her hands into her jacket pockets.
"Look… I… I know things haven't been great between us, and I don't want it to be that way. But right now, I think we should focus on figuring out where we are and how to get out of here."
"Whatever you say, B." Faith said it with total venom in her voice, but Buffy couldn't let herself get pulled back into bickering. One of them had to stay calm and rational if they were ever going to figure a way out of this mess.
"How long after you landed did I show up?"
"Wasn't exactly counting." Faith grumbled.
"Right… but was it like a few seconds, or did it seem like over a minute?"
Faith huffed, "what does this matter?"
"I don't know - but there is absolutely nothing else to work with. All we have is sand and blue sky. If more than a few seconds went by, that means time moves differently - which maybe would tell us if we were in another dimension or just another place on our own Earth."
Faith sighed, "fine - I guess it seemed almost right away."
"OK - so time moves about the same then. That doesn't prove it's our dimension - but at least there's a chance that it is." Buffy spun around again, hoping to see anything at all that could provide a clue to where they were.
"Wait… so you really did jump in right after me?" The surprise was evident in her voice.
"Well, yeah. Your speech was very inspiring." Buffy grinned despite their very dire situation.
Faith grunted - the small smile that had been forming a moment ago was totally wiped away, "sorry I inspired you - now you're stuck wherever the hell this is too."
"Faith," Buffy took a cautious step forward. "I'm glad I followed you. If I hadn't, you would have been trapped here by yourself."
Faith shrugged, "I'm sure your buddies will be working overtime to find you. So I guess that's something." The implication was clear that Faith didn't think anyone would come looking for her.
Buffy tried not to let her frustration show at Faith not being willing to accept her attempts to play nice. So she focused on ignoring Faith and trying to figure out what they should do next. "I don't see any swords."
"What the hell are you talking about now?"
"The swords those vampires had… if they ended up here too… they would have been dusted - but their swords would be left behind." Buffy thought some more, "so if they didn't come through here… that means…"
"A trap. It means I jumped us into a trap." Faith crossed her arms over her chest and raised her chin - just begging Buffy to yell at her.
"Well - it could mean someone knew we were there and set this trap for us. Or maybe those vampires have some magical traps set up just in case. Ugh. That doesn't help at all."
"So, what do we do?" Faith finally asked after several moments of silence.
"I have no idea."
Faith frowned and looked up at the sky. "There's not even a sun to follow."
Buffy sighed as she saw that Faith was right. The sky was bright and clear, but there was no way to tell where that light was coming from. "So maybe my dusted vampire theory doesn't even work. Guess we'll have to be on the lookout for them - just in case."
Faith just shrugged.
"So, I guess we just pick a direction and start walking."
"You're the boss."
"I'm not the boss of anything - just what other choices do we have? It's either we sit here and wait for something to happen or get going. I would think you'd be more into the plan of going."
"Like I said - lead the way." Faith motioned with her hands, indicating that Buffy should get moving.
Buffy gritted her teeth in frustration. "Fine." She closed her eyes and hoped that her slayer sense would tell her something. There was nothing, she couldn't feel anything, and all she could hear was the annoyed grunts coming from Faith. So she gave up and decided on just spinning around a few times and going in whatever direction she faced.
They were walking for what seemed like hours, and they had no idea if they were even going in a straight line. There was nothing to use as a marker in any direction.
"B," Faith stopped walking and called out to Buffy, staring at the ground intently.
"What's up?" Buffy turned to face her, grateful for any distraction from the endless nothing that they were surrounded by.
Faith pointed down at the sand. "Does that look like footprints?"
Buffy moved closer, "Yeah, I guess it does."
"Does it look like our footprints?!" Faith yelled and started to pull at her hair. "We're never going to get out of here!"
Buffy knelt down and tried to follow the path of the footprints that crossed over their newly made ones. She had to agree that they did look very similar. She sat down and pulled her knees to her chest.
Faith was pacing in front of her and grunting incomprehensible words of frustration. "We should split up." Faith said once she had given up on her insensible ranting.
"What? No way!"
"This isn't working - if we split up, we'll be covering more ground."
"If we split up - we'll just both be lost." Buffy stood and tried desperately not to return Faith's frenetic energy, one of them needed to stay calm.
Then an idea occurred to her. She knelt back down and began to pile the sand as tall as she could. It was slow going, but she was able to get down to a layer of sand that was more solid, and it stayed as it was.
"This doesn't seem like the time to be playing in the dirt." Faith huffed.
"I'm not playing - we can use these as markers. We walk in a straight line until we can barely see this pile, then we make another one - we keep going like that, and we'll have some idea that we're at least heading in one direction."
Faith wanted to argue some more, but she had to admit that it was a good idea. "OK, but it has to be way taller than that. We have to be able to see at least two of the piles to tell if we're still heading in a straight line."
Buffy smiled when Faith knelt down next to her and started to help her work on the pile. It didn't take too much longer until they had a substantial mound. The two slayers began to walk. They would stop periodically and build more mounds. The more they did it, the more efficient they became.
Finally, after they had built twenty-two of the mounds - Buffy saw something in the distance. "Faith! Look!"
Faith saw where Buffy was pointing and squinted. It was barely anything, but it was something - which was a whole lot more than anything else they'd seen. The slayers shared a quick glance and ran towards the dark circle in the ground.
As they approached and it became more clear, the slayers slowed. "Is that a sewer cover? What is that doing out here in the middle of nowhere?"
Faith didn't answer, only knelt down and peered into the darkness. She was about to jump in when Buffy grabbed her arm. "What the hell are you doing?"
"What does it look like?"
"Faith." Buffy started and then took a beat to figure out the right thing to say. "We can't just jump in there! We have no idea where it goes."
"It goes somewhere, and that has to be better than being here!" Faith was furious and just wanted this to be over. She needed to get away from Buffy before she started a fight that neither of them could win.
"But it doesn't have to be better. It could be a whole lot worse." Buffy is doing her best to stay calm, hoping that it might help Faith to see reason.
"Fine, then what do you want to do? Wait until we come across a mall or something?"
It took all of Buffy's self-control to not let her rage out. "How about instead of jumping in, we just peek inside. You can lower me, and I'll try to scope it out."
"No fucking way." Buffy had taken a step towards the opening, but Faith grabbed her arm and pulled her back.
"What? Why not?"
"If anyone is hanging upside down in there, it's me!"
"OK... I just figured I was lighter…" Buffy knew it was a weak argument. Faith might be an inch or two taller, but that didn't make much of a difference.
"B." Faith laughed, "either of us could hold the other with one hand and not any effort at all. I'll peek in there, and you hold my feet. Alright?" Then Faith paused, "unless you don't trust me to look? Think I'd lie about what I saw?"
"No, of course not. Either way, I have to trust you. If you were holding me, you could just drop me down there. I trust you."
Faith looked like she didn't know what to do with that response, so she just nodded and started to climb headfirst into the hole. Buffy moved quickly to grab her ankles so she wouldn't fall all the way in.
"Can't see shit down here. Lower me a bit more." Faith's voice called up, and Buffy lowered Faith into the hole. Only her feet were still above the opening.
"Shit." Faith grumbled. She still couldn't see anything. She closed her eyes and tried to use her other senses. Soon a thunderous hissing sound started to come from everywhere. Then heat, unbearable heat. She started squirming in Buffy's grip. "Pull me up!" She cried out, and only a moment later, she was yanked out and dropped onto the sand.
"What happened?"
"I… don't know." Faith was trying hard not to show she was as freaked out as she was. "It was...hot."
"Hot?" Buffy questioned, trying to give Faith the space she needed.
"Yeah, hot." Faith was shaking. She had almost once again led them into some awful situation.
"OK, let's hope we come across another one of these things then." Buffy looked around and tried to find the last mound they had made and frowned when she couldn't find it.
Deciding there was no point in discussing it, she worked to build another mound and then randomly picked a direction to walk in. They walked in silence, stopping periodically to build their markers, for what seemed like hours before Buffy started to hear something approaching.
"What's that sound?" Buffy stopped walking and turned to try and find the source of the rumbling that was getting louder and louder.
"B!" Faith pointed, all they could see was a long stretch of darkness hurling towards them. It covered the entire horizon. A large cloud of dust rising in the wake of whatever it was that was coming.
"Gotta move!" Buffy shouted, "look, there's another opening."
"What if…" Faith started, but she was cut off. The sound of whatever was approaching was too loud for her to even hear her own words.
She pulled ahead of Buffy, determined to at least die first. Diving headfirst into the opening at full speed, she was shocked to find herself underwater. Buffy was right behind her, and they had to struggle to find their way to the surface.
When they finally did, they both tread water and gasped while they tried to catch their breath.
"Can you see anything?" Buffy called out.
"Can't see shit." Faith replied, trying very hard to look like she wasn't panicking as they tread water. Faith was not a very strong swimmer, and her heavy boots were weighing her down. Buffy didn't seem to be having any trouble, and that made Faith feel the need to hide her weakness.
"Can you lift me up?" Buffy asked and maneuvered closer to Faith.
Faith wasn't sure if she could, but she wasn't going to say that. Exhaustion was already starting to set in. Still, she grabbed onto Buffy's hips and did her best to lift her out of the water and spin around. Her head dunked underwater a few times, but finally, she heard Buffy's excited cries.
"I see land!" Buffy started swimming as soon as she was out of Faith's gasp.
Faith struggled to follow her, really hoping that this land wasn't too far away. "B!" Faith had to call out a few times before Buffy heard her.
"Are you OK?"
"Yeah… just can we slow down or maybe tread for a minute? I want to take my boots off." Faith was desperately trying to keep her breathing calm, but she was no where near. She was also pretty sure she'd swallowed a gallon of seawater, which couldn't be a good thing.
"Hold on, let me help you. Try not to kick me in the face." Buffy smiled, and before Faith could question what Buffy was talking about, Buffy took a deep breath and dove under.
Faith could feel Buffy grabbing one of her legs, and she did best to tread water without kicking it. Buffy removed one boot and came up for air. She tied the laces together and looped it around her neck before diving down to grab the other.
"Thanks, B." Faith reached to take the boots from Buffy, but Buffy wouldn't let her.
"I got them. Let me know when you're ready to get going again."
Faith hated feeling less than Buffy, and right now, she felt incredibly small. She didn't quite feel ready, but she started to move again.
"Hold on, we need to check that we're going in the right direction." This time Buffy lifted Faith, much to Faith's surprise.
"Got it, B. You can put me down."
"Lead the way."
Faith was relieved that the shore wasn't too much further away. Without her heavy boots weighing her down, swimming was significantly easier. Though she did wonder how Buffy was doing with the extra weight around her neck. She was really trying to be grateful rather than annoyed that Buffy didn't seem to be struggling at all.
It only took them fifteen more minutes of hard swimming before they could touch the ground. Faith stood and tried to pretend like she wasn't on the verge of collapsing.
"That was so hard!" Buffy had to swim a little further in before she could stand, and she was taking deep breaths of air. Seeing her so winded made Faith feel a little better, though her bitterness made her wonder if Buffy was just pretending to be tired.
They made their way to the shore and collapsed into the sand. Neither quite having the energy to take in their surroundings and think of their next steps.
Faith was the first to roll onto her front before pushing herself up to kneeling. She was completely wiped out but felt the need to do something. She needed to fix this.
"See anything?" Buffy asked, still lying on her back with her eyes closed. She pulled off the boots that were around her neck and flopped them in Faith's direction.
Faith looked around as much as she could. "Looks like there are some woods not too far away." Faith crawled a little to grab her boots and began the process of shaking the water out of them.
"Do you think we could rest here for a few more minutes?" Buffy asked once she realized what Faith was planning on doing.
"I was just gonna go check it out, won't be too far away."
"Please, wait for me. I just need a few more minutes."
"Fine." Faith huffed and sat back down. The truth was that she was exhausted and could definitely do with resting for a few minutes before moving again.
"Do you… have any survival skills?"
"What?"
"Like making fire, hunting, and skinning animals - anything like that?"
"Yeah, B. I spent all my summers in wilderness camps." Faith rolled her eyes, putting as much sarcasm as she could into her voice.
"Well hopefully, we can figure something out." Buffy ignored Faith's sarcastic reply and moved to her knees while rubbed her temple. It was taking a lot of her energy not to let herself get angry at how annoying Faith was. "Now, I wish I paid more attention to those weird nature shows that Willow liked to watch."
Faith laughed, "No way did anything Red watched teach you how to skin animals."
"Oh, yeah. I guess you're right. They were much more about keeping things alive."
"Some good news - I still have my lighter and knife." Faith held up the two items for Buffy to see. She flicked the lighter and frowned when nothing happened.
"Maybe it will dry out?"
"Maybe." Faith agreed and stood up.
"Well, I guess let's go check this place out. Hopefully, there will be something we recognize there."
"You don't think this is our world?"
"I really don't." She pointed behind her. There was what looked like Earth's sun, but there was also another sizeable purplish circle. Neither slayer knew what it might be, but it was easy to draw the conclusion that they weren't on Earth.
Buffy was shocked at the shriek that Faith let out with this revelation.
"FUCK!" Faith shouted. She began pacing around in a circle, her fists held to her temple as she vacillated between shouting "Fuck" and other less coherent sounds.
After a full minute of this, Buffy realized she should probably do something to try and calm Faith down. There was just the issue of her having no idea how to do that.
"Faith?"
Faith continued to roar, and Buffy tried calling her name a few more times. She was running out of ideas when Faith finally dropped to her knees. Faith was breathing heavily, but at least she had stopped screaming.
"Faith?" She tried again and took a step closer - her movements halted when she saw Faith wince.
"Stay the fuck away from me." Faith's voice was cold and empty.
"OK - staying right here. Just… can you talk to me? What's going on?"
"What's going on? Are you serious?" Faith stood and stared at Buffy.
"Yeah… I mean… this all seems pretty awful, but we'll figure it out. We'll find a way back home."
Faith started to laugh. "You are a riot. Is that what you think? We just need to keep our spirits up, and everything will work out fine?"
"I don't think it will be that easy… but yeah. If we work together, I'm sure we'll get out of this alive."
Faith shook her head and then groaned. "Maybe. Maybe if it was just you here - that'd be true. Maybe if you didn't have the fuck up of all fuck-ups dragging you down - your perfectly charmed life would point you in the direction to get home."
Buffy scrunched her face, "what are you talking about?"
"We should split up. I have no doubt you'll stumble into the way home in no time. Just forget about me."
"Again - I have to ask what you are talking about?"
"B." Faith pushed out an exasperated breath. "You got something wrong with your ears? Just get away from me, and you'll be fine."
"But… I don't think that's true, and I'd never leave you behind." Buffy countered. "We need to work together. We'll find another portal out of here, and we'll keep jumping dimensions until we find a way back. It doesn't make sense to split up."
Faith chuckled, "it makes perfect sense. If I didn't show up tonight, you wouldn't even be stuck here. So if I leave, I'm sure you'll find your way home."
"Faith." Buffy was very near the edge of her sanity. "If you weren't there tonight, I could have lost against those vamps that jumped me. Did you forget how you saved me?"
Faith grunted and looked away.
"Look - I know I don't know very much about you - but I want to. I…"
"Bullshit." Faith hissed.
"It's not."
"Right, sure. And that's why you always invite me to hang out, right? And how you never have secret meetings behind my back? Or use me as a cover to hang out with your boyfriend? Mrs. Post might have been evil, but she was right about the fact that no one wants me around."
Buffy couldn't contain herself anymore, and she rushed at Faith, shoving her to the ground and pinning her there. "I admit, at first, I wasn't too excited about you. It was a very bad time for me, and I'm sure you don't care about that. But I've tried. I invite you to things all the time, and you always make fun of whatever it is. And as for secret meetings, the only one I know of is where everyone ganged up on me and accused me of sleeping with Angel again. I'm so sorry you got to miss out on the fun of that!"
Faith struggled to get up, but Buffy shoved her back down.
"I don't care how you want to spin this. If it's all my fault that you don't want to be my friend - fine - believe all you want that I'm an asshole who doesn't care about you. But we are not splitting up. We are working together to get home. After that, we never have to be anywhere near each other again."
Buffy climbed off of Faith and stood. "And maybe you're planning on running away the first chance you get - but I will hunt you down. And since you think my life is so easy and perfect, you should know that means I'll find you."
Faith stood and brushed the sand off herself. Totally lost as to what to say. Most of why she lashed out at Buffy was just because she was so pissed off at herself.
Buffy knelt down when it seemed like Faith wasn't going to say anything in response. She started building a mound of sand and was a little surprised when Faith helped her. After the pile was sufficient in size, they started walking along the shore.
Buffy reasoned that if they were going to find signs of civilization, the beach was the easiest to cross and had the most visibility. She was also hopeful that they might find something washed up from the ocean that they could put to use. The longer they walked, the more sure she was that they would be spending the night.
She wasn't sure how long they had been walking when she heard a sound of distress from Faith. She turned to see the other slayer clutching her stomach and dropping to her knees.
Faith started to wretch, and Buffy moved to her side without thinking. Faith didn't push her away as Buffy held her hair out of the way and watched as Faith threw up all the seawater she had swallowed.
Finally, Faith seemed to be done, and Buffy moved away. She wanted to offer her words of comfort, but she was almost positive that it would start another fight.
Faith stood and silently nodded. Buffy took this to mean it was time to move again. It wasn't too long after that when she spotted the mound of sand they had created to mark their starting point. Buffy heaved out a sigh and rubbed at her temple. Then she straightened and looked back towards the woods. She had spent a great deal of time on their trek across the beach looking for any signs of life in the woods and hadn't seen much. The trees were short and did not appear to bear fruit. The ground was covered in dense brush that looked like it was going to be very difficult to wade through.
As they moved closer, her impression of them did not improve. She was startled when Faith leaped over the first area of brush to land ten feet or so up the trunk of the nearest tree. Faith continued to climb until it became too thin to support her weight. Buffy could hear the dismayed sigh from where she stood.
Faith stayed up in the tree and began to break off branches, throwing them back towards the beach. Buffy collected them and tried to organize them into some sort of pile.
Some of the pieces looked sturdy enough to be used for weapons. She kept those separate and began thinking about how they could be sharpened with Faith's knife.
The temperature currently was comfortable, but Buffy wondered what would happen when the sun went down. Which she now realized might be very soon.
She desperately tried to remember if she ever knew anything about starting fires. She had some memory that freshly cut wood wouldn't burn very well, and that was an upsetting thought. She searched around the edge of the brush and looked for dead branches, relieved when she was able to find some.
She also collected rocks to create a fire pit. She'd seen that in movies, and even though she didn't know if it was needed, it seemed like the thing to do. Faith joined her, and after 30 minutes of work, they had what appeared to be the beginnings of a possible fire. Now they just needed Faith's lighter to work.
Buffy used Faith's knife to scrape at some of the wood, hoping to make kindling, which would catch fire. She made a little pile of the small pieces of dead branches she had found and surrounded it by a few larger pieces. She had no idea if this was going to work, but all they could do was try.
When everything seemed to be set. Faith tried her lighter a few times, but it wasn't lighting. Faith shook it and cursed at it, but it wasn't making a difference. Finally, she placed it closer to the pile of kindling that they had made and hoped a spark would take hold.
After watching Faith do this for ten minutes, Buffy started to feel like she was going insane. Deciding she had to come up with something to occupy her mind, she started weaving the thinner branches that they had accumulated.
As the wind started to pick up around them, she decided that what she was initially planning on as some kind of bedding, was now going to be a shield to protect them from the wind. She weaved as tightly as she could and did her best to fill in the gaps with smaller branches and leaves.
Faith was still relentlessly trying to start a fire, and Buffy ached to tell her to stop. The wind was picking up, and the sun was almost gone. She was pretty sure in a very short period of time, they would be freezing, and it wouldn't matter whether or not they were able to get the fire to start.
Faith finally seemed to realize there was a problem, and she looked up at Buffy with panic in her eyes. Buffy motioned her to help her on the barrier, and Faith couldn't fight her instinct to resist. She just put her back to the trees, leaning into the brush as much as possible, and wrapped her jacket around herself.
Buffy just rolled her eyes and did her best to hold the barrier around herself. Even with it, the cold wind was whipping through her. She did mimic Faith's idea of backing into the brush behind them. The woods were a very good wind barrier, but that was only protection in one direction.
Sand was tearing through the air, and she knew that Faith had to be suffering intensely.
She carefully picked up her barrier and moved closer to Faith. There was a terrifying moment where she thought she was going to lose her grip. The wind was desperately trying to suck it away. She forced Faith to take hold of one side of it and wrap it around them both.
Faith reluctantly cooperated, and when the windstorm carried on for well over an hour, she finally let her pettiness go and accepted that if they worked together, things would be better for them both.
Buffy felt Faith relax next to her, she couldn't be sure what it meant, but she really hoped it meant that Faith was going to stop fighting her on every little thing. Neither of them could survive on their own.
There was no way to know how much time they had passed huddled between their makeshift windscreen and the scrub behind them. It certainly felt like hours before finally, the wind started to let up. When it eventually died down enough to stop stinging their eyes, they lowered the screen and surveyed their surroundings. All of the wood and kindling they had prepared was gone. The stone firepit they made was barely visible under a fresh pile of sand.
"We gotta get out of here." Faith said quietly.
"Yes. We really do." Buffy was ecstatic that not only did Faith speak first, but she said 'we.'