CHAPTER 15: FAR

Did you read my mind?
Or did I fall in one outpouring?
Never unkind.
I stopped trusting
All for nothing.

My Defender,
Pure is just a word.
My Defender,
Cynical and hurt.
What changes between the covers?
What secrets are left unsaid?
What happens when nothing changes?
Is everything spoiled?
Is everything dead?

            ~My Defender, Mesh
______________________________________________

Faith stood at the edge of the cliff face, the toes of her boots hanging just over the edge. She looked down over their black tips and lifted her heels from the ground, balancing perfectly on the balls of her feet. A normal human would have swayed precariously on the tiny point of balance, probably would have pitched forward and fallen to their death on the sharp rocks below, but Faith did not even so much as quiver. Below her boots, hundreds of feet below, she could see the tide as it rolled in, crashing against the rocky shore in a slow, inexorable rhythm, and now she swayed intentionally, gently back and forth, heel to toe, heel to toe, in time with the deep sounds of the ocean. Its depths, so blue during the day, were the smooth black of polished ebony, broken only by the ripples of moonlight that flashed over its surface as it pitched and rolled, lulling her with its ancient melody.

What would it feel like, she wondered, to fall that far? Would she have time to register the pain, or would she die instantly? Would she be smashed against the rocks or impaled by their peaks?

Unbidden, the image of the portal flickered in her mind, and she was seized by the memory of dreaming free-fall.

"You don't want to do that."

Angel's voice, quiet and strong, tugging her back from her reverie. And was that just the faintest note of fear she'd heard? She might have wondered how he found her, but it was irrelevant, really. He always knew how to find her, even when she didn't know how to find herself.

"So whaddaya think?" she asked boldly, without turning. "Far enough down to kill me? I mean, I am a Slayer, after all. I took a dive off a building once and survived." She paused as if thinking about what she had just said, and Angel could imagine the expression on her face as vividly as if she had turned to look at him. "Come to think of it, that didn't work out so well," she added thoughtfully, words laced with dark humor.

"It's not worth it, Faith," he said tightly, fighting the impulse to rush the cliffs edge and grab her. She looked so tiny and waif-like out there, a half-illuminated silhouette against the starless night, dressed in the same black that surrounded her, arms out from her sides for balance, perched on the balls of her feet, hair tossed wildly by the salty, ocean wind.

She dropped her arms and rocked back on her heels, tilting her head up in a bitter laugh. "You mean you aren't worth it? Tell me something I don't know." She stepped back and turned away from the cliff, looking at him now, and he was not surprised to find her eyes filled with contemptuous amusement. "Don't flatter yourself, Angel. Much as I'm sure it would appeal to your melodramatic nature, I'm not about to toss myself off a cliff for you." She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and shifted her posture, seeming to square off against him. "I came up here to admire the view. What do you want?"

The venom in her voice almost stung him, and without being aware of it, he drew himself up to his full height, as if to better absorb the impact of her verbal punches. "I wanted to tell you that I'm sorry for what happened." He hesitated, and in the momentary silence she snorted her derisive opinion on that.

"Sorry for which part?" she demanded abruptly. Then she shrugged and tossed her hair out of her face, trying to defy the will of the wind. "I mean, it was good lay, but it's not like it was my first time. Or even the best."

He didn't even flinch at that. "I'd say it rates pretty high on the scale of intensity for physical and emotional." It was about as close to the truth of the matter as he was willing to get. He still wasn't willing to admit how much it had affected him.

He didn't have to say it though. She could hear it there, between the lines, in what he didn't say. It had gotten to him, too. She averted her eyes from his and stared down at the rock and pebble strewn ground. This was something else they shared in common, one of the traits that both of them might have been better off without. Neither of them were very open about their emotions when it came to personal matters, or even comfortable with them, for that matter. Yet in the silence that followed, somehow they understood each other completely.

"It was a spell," she said quietly.

He nodded.

"It wasn't real," she added, as if reminding herself. Yet as he looked at her, she lifted her eyes to him again, and though they tried hard to convince him that she was sure of what she said, he could see the question in them.  When he didn't answer, she pressed on. "Guess I shoulda known that when you woke up with your soul."

"Wesley… has a theory about magic and the curse. Especially since… what happened with Darla didn't remove it. Happiness is a chemical reaction produced by the brain; a spell can simulate it, but not cause it. Of course," he gave a bleak smile, "the gypsies probably didn't know anything about chemicals. Curses are also more powerful than normal magic. More permanent."

"Right." She folded her arms over her chest and turned her face slightly away, obscuring most of her features in shadow, and he couldn't read her expression at all. If he didn't know better, he'd think she was mourning the fact that he hadn't lost his soul, and while that was an incredibly stupid thing for her to lament, he also thought he understood why she would. "Just a spell," she summed up again. "So… tell me again why you're sorry?"

"I… didn't mean to hurt you."

"What makes you think you did?" she asked, harshly, flippantly. He could almost hear her defenses going up, windows slamming, doors bolting, her voice rising like an alarm. "We fucked, Angel. Not really a big deal."

He hadn't said it right. He knew there was no right way he could have said it. "I think maybe it was." His retort was quiet, but firm, and he met her eyes determinedly. He didn't want to piss her off, but they had to get this behind them before they could move on.

She stared at him, seeming incredulous, and for a moment there was nothing but the sound of wind between them. "Sorry to burst your bubble babe, but it's not like the earth moved for me. Remember? I ran out on you? You didn't even—" She cut herself short and seemed to regain her composure, giving him a look he couldn't begin to decipher. "You know what? Screw this. I've got better things and better people to do." She lifted her shoulders and shifted her stance in that way that telegraphed clearly just how done with this conversation she was, then she turned and started to walk back down the bluff.

He moved with inhuman speed, intercepting her before she got more than a few feet, and she drew up short, her expression stormy, tight-lipped and dangerous. "Get out of my way."

Steeling himself, he reached out with one hand and touched her face, tilting his head slightly as he gazed down at her. "You sure you're done with this, Faith?"

She recoiled from his touch as if his hand were a snake about to bite her, slapping it away with a hard blow. "Don't fucking touch me!"

"Why does it bother you, Faith? Why are you so angry at me?" he demanded, his voice forcing her to confront the questions. He saw her brown eyes flicker, wrestling with indecision even as they blazed furious anger at him… and then, for just a second, as if against her will, they softened, focusing on him. What he saw in her then ran so deep, so true and pure in its pain that he reached for her instinctively, not thinking of the consequences then, only wanting to touch her, to reassure her, to help her.

It wasn't until he saw the look of betrayal in her eyes, until she shoved his arms away and stormed past him, that he realized he couldn't. It wasn't until then that he realized he'd mistaken the nature of what he'd seen in her. There was no way he could be her support through this.

Stunned by understanding, he watched her run from the bluff, her tiny figure receding into the dark trees below. He had known that there was some emotion between them that was not solely based on friendship, had even suspected it had been heightened by the spell. He had expected that it would all work out somehow. After all, they'd worked around their attraction to each other just fine up until then. But he'd never expected…

Damn… he hadn't realized how much she really cared for him… and he wasn't sure at all how he felt about her.

He stood there for a long time, listening to the waves crash and pondering the depths of his still heart.

*           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *

It was a night of patrolling like no other. She sought out battles with the skill of a hunting dog, drawing out vampire and demon alike, absorbing every blow they heaped upon her with relish. Mouth bloodied and face bruised, she only grinned and taunted them on, seeming to enjoy the impact of their fists and claws, giving back just as good as she got. She drew out each fight as long as she could, taking each creature near the end of its endurance before killing it, and when she put an end to it at last, her eyes lit up with a feral, triumphant gleam. She was like a wild thing, and Spike appreciated her animal ferocity in a way that very few could.

Fascinated, he tracked her throughout the night, watching as she cut a swath of violent, ugly death through the outskirts of town. He stayed close, thinking that she might need help, knowing that eventually she would tire. But though she stumbled from time to time, missed her mark or moved a little too slowly, she was relentless, unstoppable. Possessed of effortless grace, she transcended remarkable, becoming beautiful as she sailed through the night like a shark, a deadly knife in the dark, cutting down her enemies with skillful aplomb.

He wanted to go out there with her, to join her in that mad, spinning dance of death. It had been far too long since he had cut loose like that. He could imagine their movements in unison, locked together in a spiral of vicious destruction—

He shook his head abruptly and tried to clear the image from his mind. It was too vivid for his comfort, too inviting for his liking. Like as not, she'd stick her stake in him before he'd taken out the first demon. He really needed to have himself a spot of fun before he lost his mind completely and got himself killed.

He watched her spin and dance and weave, and thought she was not as smooth as Buffy had been, but just as skilled. He watched her and he waited, and he wondered.

*           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *

Faith wiped blood from her mouth and grinned, sending a spinning kick to the vampire's head that laid him flat on the ground. So easy, such a simple thing to pivot, turn, dip and stake. Dust. The rage was so much easier to channel when it left her feeling cold and removed. The aches and pains of her body were a relief compared to the wounds inside. When she fought like this, she could forget about herself for a while, could make the whole world go away; she had complete control of everything in her world.

It was a little like being God.

*           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *

Angel scuffed his feet in a decidedly un-stealthy manner as he made his way down the streets of residential Sunnydale, hands in his pockets, thoughts far away. Whoever had sent that spell had done it to sabotage them, and sadly, it had worked. Not that he could blame Faith; after all, the spell had created false feelings and released true ones hidden deep inside them both. It was difficult to tell how much of it had been real, how much not, and if he was having a hard time, he could imagine how hard it was for her. He wondered if she'd ever shown a tender side to anyone before. He doubted it. Hell, he wouldn't even have believed she could show such a side if he hadn't seen it firsthand.

One thing was certain; they couldn't go on like this. He hadn't even begun deciphering the text of the scroll. He'd been far too busy trying to recover from their ordeal in the sewers, then the sex, and now the fallout. This needed to be faced and put to rest, one way or another before they could resume any semblance of normalcy. And before they could do that, he needed to sort out how he felt. He imagined she did, too. There was only one way that was going to happen, and much as he hated to admit it, it seemed the smartest thing they could do for now.

He sighed and looked up, finding that his feet had carried him to his destination without conscious help. He stood there, his decision made, his heart pleading for just one last chance to sway the debate, and cursed the burden of conscience he'd carried for the last one-hundred odd years, like Atlas shouldering the world.

*           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *

Beatrice was startled from her reading by a knock on the door of the house. Frowning, she rose cautiously and adjusted her glasses, cool blue eyes trained mistrustfully on the door. Faith had gone out less than an hour ago; she wouldn't be back until morning. In any case, she wouldn't have knocked, and no one else knew they were here. Except…

She took a deep breath and opened the door.

*           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *

In the darkness of the alleyway, Faith paused, holding her breath, stake poised at the ready. It had been a long night already, and it was still early, but she felt like she was ready for anything. Easing back into the shadows, she moved until she felt the cool touch of brick against her back and then went motionless, only her eyes moving back and forth over the length of the narrow, garbage strewn alley.

Seconds ticked by; the orange plastic head of a baby doll grinned up at her idiotically from the inside of a toppled trashcan, and she squashed the urge to stomp on it, forcing herself to wait patiently. She thought she'd heard…

"You really need to get a new hobby," Faith snapped angrily, emerging from the shadows with a scowl.

"Lurking is one of my better qualities," Angel answered dryly. He raised his eyes from the tips of his shoes to glance at her once, briefly, before letting his gaze fall again. Shuffling from one foot to the other, he used the awkward pause between them as a moment to collect his thoughts, gathering his courage for what he was about to say.

"You got a point, stalker-boy?" She shoved the stake in her pants and turned her back on him, kneeling down to investigate something he couldn't see with her body in the way. "Or did you come by hoping for seconds?"

He hated this. It felt like a game to him, even though he knew it wasn't. He'd gone through so much of the same with Buffy toward the end of their relationship; her needing to provoke him to an emotional reaction of some sort, just so that she could feel like he cared, or that she wasn't alone in her misery, or to pass along some of the pain she carried because she couldn't hold it all in anymore. It was a very normal and very human reaction, and from time to time, he'd been guilty of it himself—but he still loathed it. As a tool for making things better, it often didn't work worth a damn.

But if she wanted to play it this way…

"That was the spell," he said.

"Yeah, you know what? Slow as I am, I actually get that," she replied nastily, something about her tone giving him pause. He wished he could see her face. Wished she would turn toward him. "But tell me again how it wasn't real," she went on cynically. "'Cause I don't think I got it the first ten times."

He debated for a moment, hands twisting inside his trench coat pockets, then shook his head and sighed. Damn, he'd never been very good at playing this. "I don't know if I can," he answered softly, truthfully.

She stopped breathing for a second; he heard the silence clearly, and her form grew even more still than it had been before.

"You don't know?" Her tone was one of astonishment and absolute disgust. She hadn't expected that answer. She'd expected a simple 'no' to confirm that which she already knew and then she would push on with her life. She didn't want to respond, didn't want to ask, didn't want to know… and yet, she couldn't help herself. "You mean you might… whatever, with me, but you're not sure?" She did stand and turn on him then, her eyes curious and fiery all at once. "How the hell does that work?"

"Faith, I'm human too. Part of me is," he amended. "Am I not allowed to be unsure, or make mistakes? Am I supposed to be some kind of perfect, infallible hero-figure?" His eyes searched hers, seeking understanding. It was hard, incredibly hard for him to find the words, but he knew this needed to be said, now, while there was no pretense between them. He cleared his throat, but his voice was still strained when he spoke. "I—I still love Buffy. I'm still getting used to the idea that she's gone forever. I… don't know if I'm ready to love anyone else. I don't know if I can love anyone else." His expression grew weary and sad, and he dropped his eyes from hers. "I'm not really allowed to love anyone else."

"Your soul," she clarified, her mind spinning dizzily. His words had broken through the toughness of her skin and she was too off-balance just then to come up with a stinging retort.

"My soul." He nodded. "Faith, even if I was ready for something like this, what good could come of it? I could never make you happy. All I ever did for Buffy was make her miserable. It would just be the same destructive pattern all over again."

"Buffy wanted a normal life," she countered emphatically. "I just want to be the Slayer. No family, no expectations, no whining about how tough my life is because I wanna be Mary Sue Homemaker, star PTA mom and wiper of runny noses. I don't even know how to cook," she said lifting her arms and giving a short, bitter laugh. In that moment there was an innocent and yet somehow still cynical helplessness about her that he found, despite himself, completely charming. "I want to be the Slayer," she reiterated, and the unspoken addendum to that was that she wanted him to help her. That was as clear to him as if she had said it. What was unclear was whether she meant as a friend or lover. He had a feeling she'd take whatever she could get.

"I think it's better if I just go," he said, his voice low, his eyes fixed meaningfully on hers.

"What?" She was so stunned that she felt the shock jolt through every nerve of her body, traveling from her heart out through every limb, thrumming with sudden pain and adrenaline. "What?"

He turned away, head down. "You'll be okay." It sounded weak, lame, even to his own ears. "I talked to Beatrice. She may not be the motherly type but she's got your best interests at heart. She'll—"

"You talked to Ms. H?" She demanded, her voice rising angrily. Everything was spinning out of control and she couldn't find anything to grab hold of. "You're just going to—to leave me? How long have you been planning this?"

"It's not forever," his voice bordered on pleading. "Faith… it's better for both of us if we just take a break, get some perspective on things. Beatrice has a line on what's going on. I told her you'd bring her all the information we've collected. She'll be able to help you. Like it should have been from the beginning." He shook his head and let out a heavy sigh. "I made a mistake by coming here."

Anger, rage, disbelief, helplessness—they all rose violently within her and tangled together into one great spinning ball of confusion. "A mistake?"

"I should have dropped you with Beatrice and left you to the Council. I thought I could help you more, though. I thought I owed it to you… to Buffy… to me. I thought I could stay and not get involved, stick to the mission. It seemed simple. But it's just like it was before."

She had already stood there far longer than she should have, and she didn't want to be there anymore, but she couldn't make herself move. "Mission?" she asked, and her voice was very quiet, like the calm before the storm. "Is that what I am to you? Some charity you can donate to to clear your conscience?" She laughed. "I don't know about the mission, but you sure stuck me."

"I'm not good for you to be around right now. Look me in the eye and tell me it doesn't hurt to be around me."

She stared directly into his eyes, saying nothing. He tried to read what he saw there, but couldn't, her brown irises hard and removed, her heart completely walled up behind the tight set of her mouth.

"I'll be back," he said quietly, his tone sincere and heartfelt. "I know it feels like you need me right now, but you don't, Faith. You're strong, and someday you're going to realize it."

She hitched up her shoulders and shrugged, breaking eye contact with him at last. He felt more go with the severing of her gaze than a simple stare though; he felt her severing every connection they might have had. "Sure. Fine. Whatever." Her eyes glittered coldly in the fluorescence of the nearby streetlight, and then vanished as she stepped backward into the shadows.

"Faith," he called desperately, hoping to catch her before it was too late.

The sound of footsteps running away was her only reply.

*           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *

She ran like a bat out of hell, trying to forget the sound of his voice, the words he had spoken, trying to forget he had ever existed, shoving all the memories down the poisoned well of her mind. She thought she might run even farther than she had last night—no don't think about that, she commanded herself, pumping her legs even faster. She was so caught up in her own turmoil, ears filled with the sound of recriminations and the pounding of her own footsteps, that she failed to hear anything else around her. When the girl stumbled out of the bushes in front of her, no one was more surprised than Faith, and by that time, it was far too late for her to reign in her momentum.

She crashed into the girl and they hit the concrete in a painful tangling of limbs. Faith only had a second to react, a second to think to ask if the girl was okay, and then she heard the snarl of a vampire behind her.

There was nowhere for her to go. She let it leap on her, grunting as she felt and heard something crack in her ribcage, and rolled away from the girl, wrestling herself atop the creature. It grappled with her, trying to keep hold of her hands, and she squeezed with her knees, crushing the vampire's ribcage between them. It screamed in pain and let go, and in that instant she grabbed her stake and stuck it between two of the creatures cracked ribs, sending it to hell or wherever it was that vampires went in the afterlife.

She leaped to her feet and turned, wondering if the girl was injured.

"Are you—"

The girl was on her feet, eyes wide, nostrils flaring with fear, anger and adrenaline.

"You," was all she said, and there was so much hatred and venom contained in that one word that if it had been a weapon it would have killed Faith where she stood.

Willow.

Shit. My night just keeps getting better.

*           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *

Angel stood in the alleyway and let her go. He could have followed, but what more could he say? Nothing was going to make it any easier, any better. He felt terrible, like a traitor, a coward. When he'd left Buffy he had been sure he was doing the right thing, he knew it would be better for both of them. Two years later and he was just as sure that it had been a mistake. If he'd been there… maybe… but he hadn't, and there was nothing he could do to change that. He would have to carry the maybes, the could'ves and the would'ves forever, never knowing. More regret to add to the never-ending pile of regret he called a life. He had tried to stop the thoughts, had told himself that Buffy had done the only thing she could, that nothing he could have done would have made a difference… but was that the truth, or was it justification? A convenient excuse, a comfort to soothe his guilty conscience?

Faith probably thought this was easy for him, thought he was running away from her just like everyone else always had. He wished he could make her understand that he wasn't, that he did care; he just couldn't be there to hold her up right now. Not while he was being crushed under the weight of his own conscience. He had betrayed not only Faith's trust in him, but his trust in himself, and somewhere deeper, somewhere he didn't like to think about, he felt he had betrayed Buffy. A little time for both of them to get their heads screwed on straight could only help the situation. Right now, his emotions were too tangled, as were hers, for them to even have a decent conversation.

What if he was falling in love with her? The answers to that question were so multiple and spread in so many directions that he couldn't even begin to track them. They frightened him, made him uncertain, and as long as he felt that way, he couldn't be of any use to her. How could they focus on their mission if they were trying to sort out their feelings for each other? How could they trust each other when they were afraid of what the other might be making them feel? How could he be the support, the anchor, the partner and friend she needed when he was worried that he might be feeling more for her? Or worried that she might be feeling more for him?

This is for the best, he told himself, trying to silence the whispering of his doubts. It would only be for a little while… a few weeks at most. The bad guy hadn't truly won, and Faith wasn't alone; she had Ms. Hall, and he thought that might make all the difference. She could be good for Faith in a way that he could never be. He'd stop back in soon to check on her, and probably, she'd be doing just fine.

Just fine.

He shouldered the burden of his guilt with familiar ease and dug his hands deep in the pockets of his coat. Lowering his head, he turned his back on Sunnydale and the Slayer for the second time in his life.

*           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *           *

I n t e r l u d e


"Welcome to Sunnydale," read the man behind the wheel of the black Nova, bringing the car to a halt before the sign. He rubbed a hand over his jaw, bronze skin completely smooth until he reached the thick black hair at his temples that pulled away and tied back in a long, neat tail. He eyed the sign again, then ground the heels of his hands against his eyes and wished for a cigarette. Hell, even one of those artsy clove things would have worked for him at that point. With a sigh, he kicked at his nicotine demon, more a ghost after all these years than a creature of any substance, and it went with a muffled yelp. Deciding he couldn't put it off any longer, he reached over and shook his partner awake.

The slender, younger boy sat up abruptly, eyes wide as he sputtered, "Are we there?" He blinked once, sleepily, then looked at the driver. "Is this the place, Tenth?"

"This is it," Tenth answered, his voice tight, eyes meeting the younger boy's meaningfully.

"Do you think we'll find Blackwell?" he asked, too young to keep the excitement from his voice, too old not to temper it with doubt.

Tenth was of the decidedly pessimistic opinion that Blackwell was already dead, but that hardly mattered now. "I don't know, Fox."

"Do… do you think it'll be like the Oracle said?"

"It's always like the Oracle says," Tenth answered grimly. "Always."

They both stared in silence at the blue welcome sign. After a moment, the black Nova drove on toward the center of town.

___________________________________________________________


Here's the "flavor" song in its entirety. The whole thing applies so well that it's bizarre, considering that I thought of it after I wrote the chapter.

"My Defender", by Mesh

My Defender,
Protect me once again.
My Defender,
Are all my fears the same?
What changes between two people
When you're pulling their hands apart?
What changes between two people?
Happy times.
Trusting minds.

My Defender,
Save me from myself.
My Defender,
The sickness and the wealth.
What changes when words are spoken?
Enough poison for both to share.
What changes a promise broken?
It's everywhere.
Does no-one care?

Did you read my mind?
Or did I fall in one outpouring?
Never unkind.
I stopped trusting
All for nothing.

My Defender,
Pure is just a word.
My Defender,
Cynical and hurt.
What changes between the covers?
What secrets are left unsaid?
What happens when nothing changes?
Is everything spoiled?
Is everything dead?

What changes between the covers?
What secrets are left unshaped?
What happens when nothing changes?
Is everything spoiled?
Is everything dead?
What changes between two people?
Happy times.
Happy times.