Origins

by The Gramarye

Post-BS5/AS2. What if killing Ben and killing Glory were not one and the same? Buffy, Faith, and many other characters from older seasons return for an alternate BS6/AS3. Crossover. WIP.

5. Guess Who's Back?

DISCLAIMER: We both know I don't own Buffy, Faith, or any of the other characters that are making Joss Whedon and his corporate sponsors/affiliates rich. If I did, this whole college tuition thing would be much less of an issue.

Also, this is my first Buffy fanfic, so be nice.

ANTI-DISCLAIMER (would that be just a "claimer?"): Some of these characters ARE my own creation, as well as many elements of the setting. Use your head. If it never appeared in anywhere in the Kenshin series, then it's probably mine. Not that anyone cares but me.

SPOILERS/BACKGROUND: Everything from Season 1 to Season 5 and Angel Season 1 to Season 2; this picks up after S5/S2.


* * * * *

CHAPTER 5:
GUESS WHO'S BACK ... BACK AGAIN?

Buffy had just finished getting changed as the guests began to arrive.

*Man, I've got to die more often,* Buffy thought to herself with a smirk as first Giles, then Xander showed up and both buried her in the deepest hugs she ever remembered. There were tears in both of their eyes.

"Miss me?" she asked Giles with her most girlish grin as the venerable Watcher ducked in through the doorway.

He was too choked with emotion to respond, and Xander was just pulling into the drive at that moment, doing close to eighty on the Summers' 25-mile-an-hour street.

Then the surprises started, and if Buffy's mind had been whirling at the ruined high school, the slew of events she had missed only compounded matters. The first big surprise showed up alongside Xander, with a slender girl that looked to be about Buffy's age--well, at least, the age she remembered herself being--with waist-length brown hair. The girl gave a muffled squeak of excitement when she caught sight of Buffy and gave the startled Slayer a hug as crushing as the one Xander had.

"Um ... sorry, but do I ... know you?" Buffy asked.

The girl drew back from the embrace with a surprised and pained expression, but Willow interrupted before the startled girl could say anything. "Yeah, actually, I was just about to get to that."

"Willow, what ...?" the younger girl began, but Willow held up a hand for patience.

"Buffy, this is ... your sister, Dawn."

Buffy's eyes widened. "Uh ... Willow? I don't ..."

"... have a sister, I know. Trust me, you do now, and I mean it. The same blood flows in your veins and everything. It took the old you a while to accept it, too, but it was kind of painful for all of us, so I'm hoping we can skip most of it."

"How the heck do I suddenly have a sister? Did Mom adopt?" Visions flashed into her head again, as though memories of a dream, but these were even more hazy and indistinct than the brief, inexplicable visions at the high school had been, with the exception of one; there was a vision of this girl, standing on a crane at the construction yard where Buffy had just awakened, surrounded by a dreamlike aura of green energy. The vision lasted a moment longer, and the green energy dripped off of her like water, and suddenly there was a blinding flash, so bright that Buffy flinched.

"No ... well, sort of, but not quite ... it's a long story ... Buffy? You all right?"

"Um ... yeah, I think. Just something in my eye."

Giles decided it was his turn to talk. "Dawn, is it all right if I tell her ... everything?"

"Of course," Dawn answered, concernedly.

"Buffy, your sister was created ... yes, created ... by a group of powerful monks with the capability to alter time. I believe that Willow told you there was a disturbance that opened the door between worlds, that you returned through. Contained in Dawn's flesh and blood is the power that opened that door. The monks sent it to you as a sister because they wanted to make sure you protected it. The last enemy you fought captured her, and attempted to use that power for evil. You stopped her, even though it cost you ... the other you ... your life."

Buffy was silent, trying to process all this, using every ounce of steel nerves in her body to prevent herself from completely flipping out. "That ... still doesn't sound like a real sister to me," Buffy answered.

Giles nodded. "And it won't. You were outside time when it happened, outside this world, in a world where the very concept of time is, well, meaningless. But let me tell you this. Everyone else remembers her. There is a doctor in Los Angeles who remembers helping give birth to her. We all remember her moving in with you the very day you came here, we even remember you introducing us to her. There are photo albums with the two of you as children in it. Blood tests and genetics tests would show the two of you as sisters. In fact, it was the fact that the same blood flows in your veins that allowed you to give up your life to close the portal ... rather than having Dawn have to give hers."

Dawn's face was red and her mouth was trembling as Giles repeated all of this, and it was clear that he was not pulling any punches in the story, probably as much for Dawn's ears as for Buffy's. Buffy leaned back and stared at the ceiling. This was going to take a lot of getting used to. Everyone else seemed really attached to Dawn, but there was no way she could digest everything at once. She looked down again, and saw everyone nervously watching her face, trying to gauge her reaction.

"I'm ... I'm sorry, Giles. I believe you, but I ... I can't remember."

"I know, Buffy, I know."

"This is going to take forever," Buffy said suddenly, exasperatedly. "Will, is there anything you can do?"

"Do what?"

"To bring my memories back."

"I don't know ... I think there might be, but I'm not sure ..."

"It could be very dangerous," Giles interjected.

"Oh, and a four-year gap in my memory is perfectly safe," Buffy retorted.

"I'm not talking about the magic," Giles went on. "Willow is ... well, to put it mildly, amazing. She's learned magic faster than she ever learned any school subject, which is saying rather a lot. She's actually starting to get a bit of an international reputation. Even an interdimensional one." Willow ducked her head to hide a bashful grin.

"But anyway, I'm more worried about you, Buffy. Dawn is a big enough surprise to take weeks, or months, to digest, if not more. To be blunt, there are a lot more waiting for you. I'm not sure if you really want them heaped on you all at once. You didn't lead a very quiet or ordinary life, Buffy."

"Why am I not surprised?" it was clearly more statement than question.

"But there is one, and I'm afraid it's the worst of the lot, that we're going to have to tell you about. You'll find out before long, anyway, and it's probably best that you do with all of us here."

"Giles ..." Willow began.

"We can't hide it," Giles answered firmly. "She's just going to have to deal with it."

"Will you stop talking about it and tell me what the hell you're talking about?" Buffy shouted.

"I think it's better that we show you," Giles answered. He was already striding for the door.

"Where are we going?"

"You'll see." For some chilling reason, Giles' face was already full of sympathy. Buffy remembered seeing the same look on Tara's face not too long before, and several of the other members of the group seemed to have already guessed Giles' destination, and their somber faces did little to lift Buffy's spirits.

* * *

"No," Buffy croaked, unable to force her voice above a whisper.

"I'm so sorry, Buffy," Giles said. There was nothing else he could say. He put his arm around her. Willow came up a moment later and rested one hand on the back of Buffy's shoulder, and Xander clutched her hand in an awkward gesture of support. Dawn simply stood by her awkwardly, unsure if Buffy wanted comfort from a sister that she didn't know she had.

"NO!" Buffy cried again, her grief finally overpowering the constriction in her throat. She collapsed to her knees, shrugging aside the arms of Giles and Xander that tried to steady her; they let her go a second later. A moment later, she buried her face in the turf. When she managed to lift her head again, her tears flushed the dirt from her eyes, only to allow her to see the horrible stone tablet only inches from her eyes, staring at her like an accusation.

JOYCE MARIE SUMMERS
1962-2001

BELOVED PROTECTOR
TORN FROM THIS WORLD
BEFORE HER TIME
RISE AGAIN IN GRACE

"I can't believe it," she murmured, to no one in particular. She was surprised that she had even said it loud enough for anyone behind her to hear.

"None of us could," Giles said softly.

Buffy was bleeding, she realized. She had torn the skin on her palms with her fingernails, clutching them so hard that her knuckles had become white. With another choked off sob, Buffy struggled forward and threw her arms around the headstone, as though it were somehow the closest she could come to embracing her mother again.

The blood on her palms touched the epitaph.

Things got interesting.

Buffy jumped back, startled, as a golden light suddenly erupted from the front of the headstone. Buffy looked around and was glad to see that she wasn't hallucinating; everyone else had taken a step or two back as well, and an orb of fire suddenly appeared floating just above Willow's upraised palm.

The light subsided from most of the surface of the headstone, leaving only the engraved letters glowing as though Buffy's blood had somehow filled them all with golden lava. Suddenly, a hot wind burst from the stone as well, sending everyone's hair and clothing fluttering behind it and making everyone squint. More letters began to appear on the tombstone, wrought as if with liquid fire, incorporating the epitaph into them.

*There shall come a time
When the beloved protector
Shall be torn from this world
Before her time
In a dark and watery place;
Until such a time
When her beloved protectors
Shall be at rest in this world
And open time
That she may rise again in grace.*

Buffy was gaping like a fish and barely had time to read it all when the trails of fire that formed the letters swirled, and new words burst forth on the stone, now so bright as to be almost white, and nearly too bright to read; the wind died down a moment later, which helped.

*In days long gone in Babylon
The mighty fell, the weak grew strong.
The gardens covered what had gone
In days long gone in Babylon.

But darkness grew again in might.
The Cainite folk reclaimed their height.
The last defenders of the light
Fled to fight another night.

Yet one last seer with the sight
Waits late for dawn in Babylon.*

The fiery letters faded, and the wind and light subsided completely a moment later. The headstone had been wiped clean. Even her mother's name had vanished. Emotions began to boil in Buffy's chest, so mixed and powerful that she had no idea herself what she was feeling.

"Giles ...?" she asked.

The other Scoobies were still standing where they had been, dumbstruck by what had happened. Eventually, Willow ventured a hesitant opinion. "It looked ... sorta ... like a prophecy." Giles nodded a hesitant agreement a moment later, obviously still trying to work through it.

Buffy wasn't as interested in working through it. *A prophecy. Great.* That had been her first guess, too. A prophecy. Just like the one that said that she was going to die that night at the dance. Some unseen puppetmaster's script for her to follow meekly to whatever end the string-puller so desired. She had had more than enough of prophecy to last a lifetime. Several lifetimes, in fact. She had no idea what the other her had been doing this last four years, but she certainly hoped it wasn't dancing to the tunes of old men and women long since deceased--and if she had, then it was long since time to stop.

She clenched her teeth, and a white rage began to boil up in her. She had accepted her duty, accepted that she would be one lone girl against an entire world of demons and monsters, leading a life that she could never share with anyone. She had fought against overwhelming odds to save people she barely knew, had sacrificed her social life, her normal life, hell, even her *life,* period, and still they--whoever "they" were--wouldn't leave her alone. Now they had desecrated her mother's grave with their arcane telemarketing.

She threw her head back and let off a long, throaty howl into the afternoon air. "Stand back," she commanded, turning to face her friends for a moment. Whatever they saw in her eyes, it was enough; they backed up as though she had suddenly become a live grenade. She turned back to the erased tombstone. *You want to reach me, send me an e-mail,* she screamed into the silence of her mind at whoever had done this. With that, she drove her fist down onto the crown of the stone.

A detonation shook the atmosphere in the graveyard, and the branches on several nearby trees trembled, sending a shower of leaves to the earth. Buffy's eyes widened. She had hoped to just break the stone in half, or knock a fragment loose off the top. Actually, more than anything, the sane part of her mind hoped that that she simply wouldn't break her knuckles in frustration. Instead, the stone had shattered into fragments that scattered out from the impact of Buffy's hand in a shower of gravel and pebbles. Several of the Scoobies behind her cried out in shock and pain as they tried to shield themselves, and it was well that they had backed up a short distance. The base of the tombstone remained intact, but had sunk into the base of a crater in the earth several inches deep that had been excavated by the rock at ground level as it flew outwards. Buffy stepped back, looking at her hands. Had a meteorite the size of her fist struck in that very spot, it could have wrought no greater ruin.

"Buffy ...?" Willow asked hesitantly from behind her.

She turned back to face them. Apparently whatever they had seen in her face that had made them back up before had faded, but was not entirely gone. "Let's go home," she said.

They were halfway home again before anyone spoke. Buffy was riding with Giles and Willow in Giles' car; Dawn, Tara, and Xander were following in Xander's truck. They hadn't said anything on the way to the cars, but Buffy had the feeling that Dawn and Xander would have been uncomfortable riding back with her. Anger and curiosity were still warring within her, but in the end, curiosity won. Partially.

"Giles, did you recognize any of ... that?" she asked, breaking the silence.

Giles' look was distant. "I'm not sure," he answered a minute later. "There was something familiar about it. I'll check as soon as I can get over to the Magic Box."

"The what?"

"Oh, I run a shop now. The temporary high school doesn't have a libary, so everyone has to use the public one, but it meant I was sort of out of a job. And also I think several people suspect that I was the one that blew up the old high school."

"YOU blew up the high school? Man, how did I miss that?"

"Oh, you didn't," Giles said.

"I didn't?" Buffy said in a suprisingly chipper voice.

"Come on, Buffy, would you have really missed something like that?" Willow asked, turning around to look at Buffy, who was riding in the back seat.

Buffy smiled suddenly. "All right!"

Willow smiled back. "Feeling better now?"

"Much, actually."

"It's good to see you smiling again."

"We're here," Giles said as he approached the Summers' driveway.

The sight of the house suddenly brought back bitter memories, however. She still instinctively thought of her mother as living there, so seeing the house made her suddenly remember the graveyard. *The graveyard.* She was still a bit numb, she realized; her outburst at the graveyard had so stunned her that she had surpressed it for a bit. She knew it was going to take a lot longer to sink in.

"Giles ... can we go somewhere else?"

A pained expression crossed Giles face, as if suddenly realizing that coming back here might not have been the best idea in the first place. Willow seemed to become suddenly aware of the same thing. "Magic Box?" she suggested.

"Sure."

"I'll call Tara," she said, leaning back in the seat.

"You have a cell phone now?" Buffy asked.

"No, but she does."

"Uh ..."

"I don't need one," Willow responded, her eyes going distant. Buffy watched, half confused, half amazed, as there was a soft, brief beeping sound from somewhere, and then Willow spoke into thin air.

"Hey, Tara? ... Yeah, we're heading to the Magic Box ... I'm not sure home is really where she wants to be right now ... no, we just had pizza, get something else--hey Buffy, what do you want for dinner?"

Buffy could only gape.

Willow grinned mischievously. "From the looks of things, I'd say fish ... no, honey, I'm kidding--sure, chicken sounds fine. Oh yeah, we may be a while, we'll call you if we're going to be too late, otherwise we'll pick it up on the way back, 'kay? Love you." There was a soft click in the air in front of Willow that sounded exactly like a receiver being hung up.

"Will, that was awesome!" Buffy gasped.

Willow shrugged. "I learn what I can."

Giles' approval seemed a little more cautious. "Willow, you may want to think twice about using magic for such ... spurious ... uses, you know."

"We've been over this," Willow pointed out in a very bored tone. "But we needed to tell the others where we were going and it would have looked really conspicuous if I made smoke signals out of the exhaust."

Giles wrinkled his nose at her.

The Magic Box was a quaint, cheery little shop, with a bright blue awning above the door and front window and what looked to be all manner of occult products inside. Buffy only remembered two other occult shops in Sunnydale from when she was here, but one of them had been very dark and Gothic, and both had been rather small; the Magic Box was clearly a bit bigger a place. There were only two other cars in the lot as Giles pulled in, however. "You own this place?" Buffy asked. Giles nodded.

Two elderly women were leaving the shop just as Buffy, Willow, and Giles entered, one carrying a large bag of--stuff. Buffy didn't want to think what all might be in it. When she got into the store, she realized that the only other car in the lot had to belong to the shop assistant working behind the counter. She had her back turned as the three of them walked in.

"Oh," Giles said as he saw her. "Maybe I ought to go first."

"Huh?"

"She ... knows you."

"Oh."

It was a bit late to think of that, however, as the girl suddenly turned around, apparently copying down something in a thick spiral-bound ledger, when she looked up and saw Buffy. The ledger crashed to the floor, and she put both hands to her face with a startled yelp. There was no other word for it. It was a yelp.

"Anya, calm down," Giles said, "I'll explain."

"Well, I certainly hope so!" the girl replied, her breathing still unsteady. "Because it's going to take a lot of explaining before I'm calm again!"

"All right then, let's see. Buffy, this is Anya. She used to be a demon, by the way."

"Hi!" Buffy said, cheerily, reaching out to shake the startled shop assistant's hand. "I'm Buffy. I used to be dead, by the way."

The girl suddenly caught Buffy's hand and put two fingers against the underside of her wrist; Buffy tensed reflexively, and it took a moment before Buffy realized that the girl was checking for a pulse. She grinned.

"Come on, I don't look THAT dead, do I?"

"No, but neither do vampires."

"The sun's up."

"Oh, I know, but ... how did .."

"We're still not completely sure," Giles interceded.

"And why were you introducing me to her? We sort of know each other."

"Not ... exactly," Giles answered, and he proceeded to explain to Anya what Willow and he had guessed, and admitted that they still had a lot of unanswered questions. He also told Anya about the incident at the graveyard, though he didn't mention the fact that Buffy had destroyed her mother's erased headstone.

"I see. All right then." Anya fixed Buffy with an unreadable look, but it was unthreatening. "I'm happy you're back."

Buffy smiled. "You're taking this a lot better than most of the others."

Anya shrugged. "I try not to be surprised by anything that happens in this town."

Buffy let out a tense breath, and relaxed, even though she hadn't been aware that she had been so tense or holding her breath. "Heh. I see some things haven't changed."

"Still the same old Hellmouth," Willow affirmed.

Giles had climbed a small, steep staircase to a balcony at the back of the store that was roped off at the top. The balcony filled the back part of the store, and all three walls were lined with bookshelves. He rustled around for a minute, while the three girls below waited in uncomfortable silence; Buffy and Willow had so much to talk about that they didn't know how to begin, and Anya continued to try to examine Buffy for signs of her not being what she seemed.

"Here we are," Giles said, backing his way down the stairs with a large, surprising new-looking leather-bound volume in his hands.

Willow was giving Giles an odd look. "Giles ... isn't that sort of a little ... basic?"

"It's not an original," Giles admitted. "But if I'm right, we aren't going to have the original of that prophecy here in the store, or at my place, for that matter."

"Why am I liking the sound of this less and less?" Buffy asked to no one in particular.

"You know not all prophecies are all doom and gloom," Willow noted.

"Most are, though," Anya interjected cheerfully.

"This one's rather a mix," Giles said, opening the book to a page near the end. There, scrawled on the page in an elegant script, were the words to the second block of writing that had appeared at the cemetery.

Buffy looked at it and nodded. "So what's the rest of this prophecy say?" she asked, steeling herself for a rough answer. *I just got back, it can't be time to die again yet.*

"That's just it. No one knows."

"Excuse me?"

"That book is basically a beginner's guide to the prophecies of the ancient world," Giles answered. "There are bits and pieces of a lot of different prophecies in there. That verse is simply the beginning of a huge work called the Babylonian Codex."

"Codex? Is this the same one that said ... that night ..."

"What? Oh, no, that was a much later codex. Much later, much shorter, much more understandable--though hardly plain English."

"So this one ..."

"Is older. Larger. Maybe I need to back up a bit."

"Please."

Giles nodded, and Buffy could see his familiar lecture mode taking over.

"A while ago now, though not so much for you, Buffy, we were in the school library, and I explained that for many years, demons walked the earth; popular lore describing a primordial paradise has been a little dressed up.

"After a while, however, things in the world began to change. The planet became more ... hostile ... for whatever reason, to supernatural creatures. Most of the demons fled to greener pastures, and it was only through one unintended event that any were able to stay in the first place."

"This was the creation of the first vampire, I'm guessing," Buffy injected.

"Yes, though that's not the end of the story, but yes. When the last demon to leave this world fed off the blood of a human, he created ... a crack, I guess. An aberration that allowed a few--just a few--weaker demons to return eventually. Eventually, those few found ways to convince some of their former masters to return, bringing back lore that should have been lost.

"After a generation of this, a seeress arose in one of the early human kingdoms, a woman about whom we know very little other than that she was extraordinarily gifted, and was able to perceive the past, present, and future, not merely the future. The histories are foggy, but it's generally known that she was able to unite the ancient human kingdoms against the demons. For a while, she merely used her knowledge to help the people of the ancient Sumerian chiefdoms defend themselves. Then the Slayer appeared, and the wars began in earnest. There were horrible wars throughout the Middle East, wars that no recorded history has ever spoken of, wars that were allowed to pass out of thought and memory within two or three generations. We know next to nothing from these times; all records of them were destroyed, and the societies that lived in those times passed into the realm of myth, like Atlantis and Camelot and Eden and any number of other legendary places people have heard about today. The Babylonian Codex is one of only two surviving works from the entire period.

"What we do know, obviously, is that in the end, she lost, since, well, demons are still around. However, from the mere fact that the prophecies were written in Babylon, we know that she had to have had a great deal of success."

"Why's that?" asked Buffy.

"Because originally, well before humans lived there for a long time and made the Babylon that you hear about in the history books, the one that was destroyed by the Assyrians, Babylon was the city of the vampires. Nod, they called it, after the land in which the first vampire arose. With the aid of the Slayer, the seeress' forces took the city. The first vampire is said to have died in that battle--along with the Slayer. They killed each other.

"Their celebrations were short-lived. A span of years--at least seven, maybe more--passed, and the vampires regrouped. In the meantime, the new Slayer had been called, but for one reason or another, the seeress could not find her. Her visions were suddenly consumed by the future, over a span of seven years, and that is when the Babylonian Codex was written.

"Her people continued to fight. They had no alternative, but without the Slayer, the tide turned against them. Finally, when all but Babylon itself had been lost, the seeress gathered a group of her wise men together and arranged for them to be hidden, to take shelter, and to dedicate themselves to preserving what records of her prophecies they could gather on their way out, and to finding and preparing the next Slayer to carry on the battle.

"Babylon fell shortly afterward, but the victory was hollow. The seeress allowed the vampires into the city, while as many of the people as she could arrange fled through secret tunnels out of the heart of the keep. Then, when the outer rings of the city were teeming with vampires and demons, the seeress destroyed the city. Completely. We don't know how. Whatever knowledge she used has long since been lost, and the only way we even know this at all is through the captured writings of several ancient demons who survived the battle, who were cautious enough not to want to lead the charge, much as they wanted the seeress' blood themselves. It's fairly obvious that the survivors were in the minority. Most of the greater demons of that age perished that day, and the earth swallowed their ruins. The destruction was more total than anything seen on this planet until Hiroshima, possibly even more than that.

"The city was gone, though a magnificent garden sprang up on the site of the battle, as though the earth were remembering her sacrifice. This was later discovered by the fractured, regrouping humans and was sculpted into the Hanging Gardens by the Babylonians that historians know about."

"For something that you say has been lost to history, you seem to know a lot about it," Willow noted.

"I should. We should, I should say. The wise men that the seeress arranged to escape from the city, to preserve her vision and make sure that the world would never go for years on end without a Slayer, became known as the Watchers."

Buffy had been growing restless, since the story was taking a while and she still hadn't learned a great deal about this so-called Codex, but her eyes widened at that. She had known that the Watchers' Council had been in existence for nearly as long as the Slayer, but it had never occurred to her to wonder how it had all started. That was something to take in.

"Giles, the Codex," Willow asked, suddenly playing the role of the impatient one, as though taking over for Buffy while Buffy digested the news. "What does it say about her?"

"Well, as I said, we don't know. But, from everything we've been able to decipher, we suspect ... everything."

"Everything?" Buffy asked, exasperated me, throwing up her hands. "I wonder, do they have the date and place of my second funeral, too?"

"Third," Anya corrected.

"Buffy, no," Giles said gently. His voice had suddenly grown hushed, almost reverent. "It ends with the end of the war."

"What war?"

"Yours, ours, everyone's. The one that's been raging across every continent and culture for the last several millennia. It ends, Buffy, with the Last Battle ... win or lose."

Buffy gave a thoughtful but nonetheless skeptical look. "And does it say whether or not I win or lose this Last Battle?"

"No," Giles says. "It ends when the battle begins."

"Well that's a help."

"This kinds of things can't be foreseen. Prophecy is an inexact art, to put it mildly, even in the best of circumstances. These kinds of moments are altogether beyond its limits. They're beyond the grip of fate.

Buffy actually smiled. "So there's no guarantee that I'll die this time."

"Or that you'll live," Anya pointed out.

"Thanks," Buffy said pointedly.

"Just keeping things in perspective."

Willow chimed in. "And hey, at least it looks like you'll be living to get to that battle," she pointed out. "That should be worth something."

Buffy thought for a moment, then brightened. "It is, actually."

* * * * *

"Studying hard?" a woman's voice asked.

Faith turned around and looked up to see a woman she had never seen before standing at the entrance to the secluded alcove where Faith had been studying for the last hour. She was roughly Faith's height, with the same raven hair, though slimmer and less of a physical presence than Faith. She was older than Faith, though certainly no more than ten years, probably shy of her thirtieth birthday. At least she didn't seem to be much of a threat, and Faith's sixth sense that told her when she was in danger was silent. She was wearing a small, sterling silver cross on a thin chain around her neck as well, something that Faith doubted very many vampires would do even on the outside of their clothing. Nonetheless, something in the back of Faith's mind told her that this woman was somehow more than the average patron of the Ancient Eye.

"What's it to you?" Faith asked suspiciously.

"Oh, nothing really," the woman answered. "Though don't you think there might be more of a future in studying computers or something?"

Faith gave the woman an icy glare. "Yeah, well, why don't you worry about your future, and let me worry about mine?"

The woman laughed. She had a beautiful smile, Faith admitted. "Hey, hey, I'm in here, too, you know," she answered. "Sometimes I can't get the stuff in these books out of my mind. Computers pay better, but this stuff can be fascinating."

Faith wanted to slap the woman. She hated studying, and a lot of these books were written in Old English. There were even a few written in Gaelic and Latin and other languages that she didn't understand, and she could never shake the feeling that those were the ones that held all the real answers. "I don't think fascinating is how I'd describe it," she answered, trying to remember that she had been working on developing patience before her escape from CIW.

"Give them a while, they grow on you," the woman replied amicably. "Take Chameleous Thanators, for example," she continued, tossing a thick, aged journal down on the table in front of Faith. "I wonder where these ancient writers would get the inspiration to dream up a demonic shapeshifter with a liquid skin."

Faith's eyes snapped to the journal in front of her, and widened. The book was indeed written in a language that she didn't understand, but the pictures were all too clear. The one above the title of the entry clearly showed a creature that could have been the twin of the one that attacked her in prison, and there was an illustration on the following page showing a corpse of the same creature, complete with the liquid skin dissipating off of the body and the thin, flexible bones beneath. After staring at it for a moment, Faith swung her gaze back to the woman on the far side of the table.

"It says that they're assassins by nature," the woman continued, "and that the easiest way to stop them is with an electrical shock. They also tend to favor adopting female forms because they're somehow less threatening." The woman fixed Faith with a piercing stare. "Personally, I don't think they know too much about this reality, though. I know some pretty dangerous women out there."

"Mm, they're out there," Faith replied noncommittally.

The woman smiled and let that pass, though Faith guessed that she knew perfectly well who she was talking to. Which, of course, brought up the fact in Faith's mind that the reverse was not true at all.

"You know, I hate to pry, but who are you?" Faith asked.

"Huh? Oh, I'm sorry," the woman answered, looking genuinely apologetic. "I guess you wouldn't know me. Janna. Janna Kalderesh."

"Faith," the midnight-haired Slayer responded, though she was sure that Janna already knew that. Janna simply nodded.

"Anyway ... ah ... you want a coffee or something?" Janna asked. "I've been here since five in the evening, and all I had for dinner was a bagel from the cafe down the street."

"Umm ... sure, whatever," Faith answered, grateful both for the offer and for the chance to get away from those infernal books for a little while. After all, Janna, whoever she was, had already pointed out exactly what Faith had come there to find in the first place, so there really wasn't much of a reason to stay, especially if she could somehow convince Janna to give her the short version of the story.

The pair ended up at an all-night Italian bistro a block away from the Ancient Eye. They spent a long while there, taking advantage of the quiet, uncrowded atmosphere ... and the bottomless garden salad and breadsticks.

"So how did you find me?" Faith asked, once it became clear that the small talk was about finished.

Janna shrugged. "I heard that you escaped, and that the Order of Turaca had sent a Thanator after you. A couple days later, I heard you were back in L.A. It was pure luck that you happened into that bookstore when I was there, though. I never thought I'd see you there. Slayers aren't known for their study habits."

Faith shrugged that aside. "The Order of What?" she asked.

"Turaca," Janna repeated. "They're some of the highest-priced demonic assassins money or anything else can buy. Usually they ask for more than money, I've heard. I actually haven't known about them that long. That's one of the things I was looking up when you showed up."

Faith simply nodded, then changed the subject when a different thought crossed her mind. "How did you know who I was when I walked in, anyway? I've never seen you before."

"Your picture was all over the news before you turned yourself in," Janna reminded her.

*Oh, duh,* Faith thought to herself. She remembered seeing her face on the evening crime report that evening at Angel's. Still, she had a feeling that Janna was somehow more in on the loop than that. "Did Angel send you?" she asked.

A secretive smile passed across Janna's face. "Not quite," she said with a laugh. "I think he'd be really surprised to see me, actually."

"So you know him?"

"From a few years back," Janna answered. "I haven't seen him in almost four years, and I didn't know him that long. I know a lot about him, though. He's kind of a legend, after all."

Faith nodded. "I guess he is. I guess I really didn't know him that well, either, though. I wish I'd gotten to know him better."

Janna nodded in agreement. "I think you and he have a lot in common, actually. Have you been to see him at all since you got back?"

Faith shook her head. "I tried once, but I never actually got to see him. Since then, I've sort of been too busy hiding. Plus I heard about what happened in Sunnydale. I think he has other things to worry about than me right now, you know?"

"True enough," Janna said, turning an appraising look on the teenage fugitive across from her.

Faith noticed, and gave a questioning eyebrow in response.

"Nothing," Janna answered. "I think you've grown up a lot in the last couple years, though. Everything I've read about you was written before that mess at Sunnydale's graduation a few years back."

Faith shrugged. "A lot has happened since then."

Janna laughed. "I guess it has. Of course, a lot happens every day. Most people just refuse to learn anything from it."

Faith couldn't stifle a small smile. She had had the same thought herself several times during her abridged stay in prison.

"So then, I guess the only thing left is, what do you want from me?" Faith asked at length.

Janna looked hesitant for the first time that evening. "Depends on what you want, I guess. I don't really have any kind of authority, but I doubt that's what you want, anyway. That was the Council's biggest mistake from the beginning."

"The Council?" it had been a while since Faith had heard that name, but it still did not ring any pleasant bells.

Janna finally decided to drop the bomb. "Have you ever thought about having a Watcher again?" she asked.

* * *

Faith sat alone on the roof of the homeless shelter where she had made her abode since her escape. Her eyes gazed unblinking at the starlit heavens, and she had long since tuned out the din of the soup kitchen below. She barely moved, but her thoughts were racing like wildfire.

*A Watcher.* The thought reverberated endlessly in her mind. Even if Janna was completely unaffiliated with the Council like she said, and Faith believed the woman was telling the truth, the concept had become so alien to her since she and Buffy had first parted company that she had no idea how to react. Obviously, getting up and walking out of the restaurant without saying a word had been her first reaction, but she had no idea how to react after that.

She wished she had at least stayed to learn more. The woman obviously knew a lot, and knew where to get more information, too. That in itself put her a notch above Faith. Janna had seemed fairly open to conversation, too, even if she did seem to be fumbling to find her way at times after she got past the basics. Faith didn't believe the woman was deliberately trying to hide anything. She had the same air of openness and honesty that the Scoobies had had back in Sunnydale.

*Why on Earth would she want to help someone she's never even met?* Faith asked herself. There were any number of answers to that, though. The woman apparently knew Angel from somewhere, and anyone connected to Angel might take an interest in her. Also, she had known Angel several years ago, when he had still been in Sunnydale, so there was a chance she knew some of the others in the Sunnydale gang. Had she been connected to Buffy somehow? It certainly wasn't impossible, if she had been in Sunnydale in the last few years. Then again, why would someone want to help her if they were connected to Buffy? Buffy hated her, though Buffy would never work through someone else when she was alive. She couldn't imagine the sunny-haired Slayer leaving instructions along the lines of 'if anything happens to me, bring Faith down with me.' Then again, there was also the simple fact that Faith was a Slayer. Good or evil, it was generally considered better to be on a Slayer's good side than the reverse. If Janna had enemies among the supernatural lurkers in L.A., having a Slayer in the neigborhood that wanted her alive could be a very good thing, to put it mildly. With a grimace, Faith realized that that Janna had already succeeded in that regard. In the back of her mind, Faith already didn't want to see anything happen to the mysterious woman, especially not before Faith had the chance to learn more from her.

It pained her, but she forced herself to admit that she needed help. If what Wesley and Cordela had told her was true, Angel couldn't help her anymore, not until he was through his grief, which looked like it could easily be years. *In vampire years, too,* she added in the silence of her mind. The only other people who had shown any interest in her had been Wolfram & Hart, and she had a sneaky suspicion that they were the ones who had send that Chameleous Thingamabob after her. She would rather take her chances with a complete stranger than with them again.

Bit by bit, Faith worked up her courage to go see her again. She had no idea where the woman lived, but she had a feeling she knew where to start looking. Hopping down from the roof of the shelter, she turned back towards the Ancient Eye. There was still a long time until they closed; they were open later than most nightclubs. After all, a lot of their clientele didn't wake up until after sunset.

Sure enough, Janna was sitting in the same alcove where Faith had been sitting a few hours earlier. She was transcribing something out of a thick, glossy leather-bound tome into a slim spiral notebook. She looked up and put her pen down immediately after Faith walked in, however. Faith gave her a nod, and Janna answered with a slight smile. Quickly, Janna shut the black book and returned it to its place on the shelf, gathered her things, and joined Faith out on the street.

"You want to talk a little more before you say anything?" Janna asked. The question sounded comical, but it was appropriate.

"Sure," Faith answered.

Janna smiled, and gestured around the side of the building with a flick of her head. "Come on, you can crash at my place tonight. No offense, but you look like you've been staying in a homeless shelter or something."

Faith chuckled wryly. "None taken," she answered.

There was a public parking garage on the far side of the block from the Ancient Eye, and Janna set a direct course for it, through the back alleys. Faith wondered at that; the woman didn't seem to be afraid of much. The back alleys in this part of town were no place for a lone unarmed woman. She decided to let it pass, though; thinking about commenting on someone else's lack of caution almost made her laugh.

For whatever reason, Faith had been expecting to see a beat-up old junker like Giles drove. When the women reached the garage, therefore, she was stunned to see Janna stop beside a sparkling silver 2001 Porsche Boxter, looking like it had been driven straight to the Ancient Eye from the showroom.

"Damn, Janna, why didn't you tell me about this earlier?!" Faith couldn't resist saying with a smile.

"Like it?" Janna asked rhetorically. "I just got it two weeks ago. I got a great deal it, too. The dealers are all trying to make room for the 2002 models."

"Even so, that's gotta be still more than I make in a year," Faith added.

Janna laughed. "Like I said, computers pay better," she said as she unlocked the doors.

"Is that what you do?" Faith asked as she settled into the passenger seat.

Janna smiled and looked Faith in the eyes as she started the ignition. "Just my day job," she answered.

* * *

Watcher or no Watcher, Council or no Council, Janna's apartment was everything Faith would have expected a Watcher's residence to be. It was a lot like Giles', actually, though it was a little smaller and perhaps a notch classier. Floor-to-ceiling walnut bookshelves lined several walls in more than one room, including all available wall space in Janna's bedroom. Most of them were filled with texts that clearly dealt with the occult, and many of the rest were unmarked and almost certainly dealt with the same. A long, flat worktable next to Janna's computer center in one corner of the living room supported several stacks of notebooks exactly like Janna had been working on at the occult bookstore. An expansive hutch above it housed the only non-occult books Faith could see in the apartment; they were computer programming guides and other technical manuals of some form or another. Faith wondered why the woman ever needed to go to the Ancient Eye. She practically had a full-fledged library of the supernatural within arm's reach.

"Wow, nice setup," Faith said as she doffed her jacket on the sofa in the living room.

"Thanks," Janna replied, helping herself to the plush rolling chair in front of her computer and swiveling it around to face Faith before sitting down. She motioned for Faith to help herself to the couch, which it looked like the homeless Slayer was about to do anyway. Faith crashed to the cushions, kicking off her shoes as she did so.

"Where'd you get all this, anyway?"

"I got a lot of it from my tr ... my family a little while ago. They move around a lot, and a lot of these books were getting really beat up in traveling. They still kept all the really good stuff, though."

"You still keep in touch with your family?" Faith asked, a small, involuntary pang of envy touching the fringes of her thoughts.

Janna gave a sad smile and shook her head. "I honestly got most of this stuff just last month, and before that, I hadn't seen them since the last time I saw Angel. I've been really out of the loop for a few years."

"You're new in town, aren't you?" Faith asked suddenly.

Janna nodded. "Does it show somehow?"

"No, I'm just saying, you've been in this apartment less than a month, you're driving a car that's less than a month old, and you got all these books just a month ago. Did you even have a life before last month?"

Janna laughed mysteriously. "Not really," she admitted. "I think a lot of my family thought I was a ghost or something when they saw me."

Faith shrugged. A lot of her family probably wouldn't even recognize her enough to mistake her for a ghost. At least Janna had screwed up the courage to go see them again, even if all she wanted to do was leech old books off of them.

"So what else did you want to talk about?" Janna asked.

Faith shrugged, and made a noncommittal expression. "Why are you doing all this?"

"Why not?" Jenny answered.

"I asked first."

"OK, OK," Jenny continued. "Because you're going to be needed. And because the Council doesn't want anything more to do with you. And because I think I can help. Because I believe in what Angel started with you, and he's too out of it right now to help you himself." She arched her eyebrows at Faith. "That good enough?"

Faith was silent.

"Faith, I know I sprung this on you kind of fast ..."

"Kind of fast?" Faith burst out. "More like a bullet! I haven't even known you for a day yet, and here you're saying 'hey, let me be your Watcher.' What am I supposed to think?"

"I'm just learning here, too, Faith. I'm sorry," Janna finished.

"Do you know what happened to my last two Watchers?" Faith pressed. "One of them got killed. No, not killed. There isn't even a word for what happened to her. The other one, I practically tortured to death. Why the hell would you want to get mixed up with me?"

"That was all before Angel," Janna reminded her. "I haven't spoken with him, but I know he believes that you want to change. If he believes it, so do I. And, I think, so do you."

Faith was silent again, for a while longer this time, digesting what she had just heard. That sounded a lot like what Anne had told her, and she had lived with Anne for two days now with no evidence that the girl was anything but honest. How many lives had Angel touched, that they were willing to do things for her just for the memory of him, just because he had trusted her? Nothing in Janna's tone or posture had really set off any alarms in the back of Faith's mind; it was more just the preposterousness of the whole situation. Still, she admitted, crazier things had happened. She had been the cause of a few of them herself. She also reminded herself of what she had admitted to herself on the roof of the homeless shelter. She did need help, and if she turned Janna down, she was going to clueless as to where to start looking for it. If Janna had any connections with demonic forces, well, practically everyone Faith knew did as well. She didn't seem like the type to be working for Wolfram & Hart, at least; she was dressed well enough, but she didn't have the blatant ego that seemed to characterize every member of the enigmatic law firm.

"If I do accept," Faith asked at length. "Where do we start?"

"I don't know," Janna admitted. "Are you working at all?"

"What, like a real job?"

"Like a day job."

"Oh, hell no."

Janna shrugged whimsically. "I don't blame you. Day jobs suck."

"Pays for this place, doesn't it?"

"That's why I put up with it."

"So where would we start, then?" Faith asked again.

A slight grin touched Janna's mouth. "How about with a shower, some fresh clothes, and a night's sleep?" she suggested.

Faith looked down at the thrift-store ensemble she was wearing; it was one of only two outfits she had managed to come by since her escape, and both of them had been fairly worse for wear even before Faith had gotten her hands on them. She hadn't showered in almost two days, and even that one had been more of a rinse than a real shower.

"Works for me," she said, the mere mention of sleep seemingly having laden her arms with exhaustion.

Janna nodded towards the bathroom door. "Shower's in there," she said, as though Faith couldn't have figured it out for herself. "I'll go get you a towel and something to sleep in. The couch folds out into a bed, so you can just crash here in the living room."

Faith was already making a beeline for the bathroom door as Janna spoke, shedding the thrift-store rags en route.

After one of the longest showers she had ever taken, a revitalized Faith stepped back out into Janna's living room, clad in a long black nightdress. Janna had already unfolded the couch for her, and the thrift-store rags were nowhere to be seen. Janna herself was still at her computer, apparently doing something on the Internet, but Faith could discern no more than that. Computers had never been her strong suit; she had always considered them too nerdly to get involved with. Her mysterious benefactor had also gotten changed for the night, having donned another nightdress almost identical to Faith's.

Janna slid the keyboard tray under the desk when Faith emerged. "Much better," she complimented the rogue Slayer. "You clean up well."

"Thanks," Faith replied, hopping immediately into the cushions of the fold-out bed. It wasn't a feather mattress, but it was the best Faith had slept on in a long time.

"So now what?" the raven-haired girl asked again, after making herself comfortable under the covers.

"Well, if you're feeling up to it, you can start training tomorrow morning," Janna offered.

"Hey, I'm game," Faith answered. The shower had done wonders for her mood.

"All right, I'll be around at five," Janna said, getting up to head for her room.

Faith sat bolt upright in bed. "FIVE?!" she exploded. Even in prison, she hadn't needed to roust herself until after six.

"You up for it?"

Faith suppressed a glower. She knew there had been a catch in this offer somewhere. Still, there was really nothing to be said against it. For the first time in a while, save for her time in prison, she was actually sleeping at night and getting up during the day. "Five by five," she breathed as she drifted off to sleep.

* * *

*Five by five, hell,* Faith thought to herself. *Beats working out in a library, though.*

She was on her second tour around the string of Nautilus machines in the basement of Janna's apartment building; the setup was rather modest, but neither Janna nor Faith was comfortable with the idea of training anywhere more conspicuous. The building had a small exercise room in the basement that went unwatched and largely unused, with a small lineup of exercise machines and free weights and a Bowflex machine that the landlord had gotten for the previous Christmas and had already grown tired of. She was glad for the solitude; although she still had quite a few questions that she wanted to ask Janna, she had more than enough to think about by herself. There was also the issue that, had anyone been around to see it, Faith was using weights that would have made many a passerby stop and take notice; she was using more than she had ever known she was capable of, and was barely even working up a sweat. Janna had told her that she wouldn't be back until six, so Faith had a lot of time to work with and didn't really plan on going anywhere else, so there was no sense in overexerting herself early. In addition, she was already using the maximum weight on every weight machine in the room.

After a few hours, she took a break, heading back up to Janna's apartment on the third floor. She had been surprised when Janna had left a key with her; the woman was surprisingly trusting considering they had just met, and Faith was an escaped convict. Then again, when she stopped to think about it, Faith had been equally trusting of Janna, spending the night at her apartment having only met the woman the same day. Nonetheless, the danger sense that had gotten Faith out of a lot of scrapes in the past stayed silent, so she didn't read much into it. She let herself into Janna's apartment and immediately headed for the refrigerator; she hadn't felt that hungry coming up the stairs, but the sight of the refrigerator somehow propelled the thought of food forward in her mind.

As soon as she opened the fridge, her chin dropped in disappointment. Janna hadn't mentioned that she was a vegetarian. There were two separate bowls of salad, several bottles of apparently homemade fruit and vegetable juices as well as water, some kind of casserole, and cornbread. Faith had nothing particularly against vegetarians, but she found herself wishing that there were something a little more substantial available, since she didn't want to risk going out for food. There was also the fact that she was basically dead broke.

Resigning herself to having just a glass of water and a bagel, she collapsed on the couch, which Janna had folded up again that morning. Her eyes wandered, and for no reason that Faith could fathom, settled on the pile of journals next to Janna's computer. She recognized the one on top; it was the one that Janna had been using the previous night at the Ancient Eye, when she talked about the Thanator and the Order of Turaca. Half instinctively, half because she had nothing better to do, she got up to have a look.

The first thing that struck her was the amount of images and diagrams; Janna was apparently a first-rate artist. Janna had also translated a great deal of the Old English and other languages into modern English, making everything a lot easier on Faith's eyes. Faith remembered the one time she had bothered trying to read the journals of her first Watcher, and run headlong into four or five different alphabets and Heaven only knew how many different languages. Janna had left touches of what looked like Gaelic and Latin in some places, which Faith guessed were either incantations or things that simply didn't translate well, but everything else looked remarkably well organized--and often illustrated, which Faith appreciated immensely.

She set the book down after another minute, after locating the pages where Janna had written about the Order of Turaca. There wasn't a whole lot more there than Janna had already told Faith: they were demonic assassins of extremely high caliber, with a wide range of abilities and a price tag that generally involved a good deal of money as well as some things that money couldn't buy. They were known for cunning, patience, and political skill as well as sheer ferocity; there was only one mention of a time when they were forced to negotiate on someone else's terms in all the centuries of their history, and the details of that were apparently kept a jealously guarded secret. The encouraging thing was that they generally contracted by the assassin, or sometimes by the cell, so facing them wasn't necessarily one of those we-hunt-you-'til-you-die kind of deals; of course, that was almost never an issue. Faith noted that Janna had scribbled in the margins, "Buffy survived ... first survivor this century?" Faith had assumed that, having known Angel, Janna would also have known Buffy, but this suggested that Janna might have had more knowledge of Buffy's exploits than Faith had suspected. She skimmed through the rest of the notebooks looking for other mentions of the sunny-haired Slayer's name, but didn't find any, and by the time she was through, she didn't feel like going through any of the other notebooks in the stack.

Instead, she turned her attention to the rest of Janna's apartment. She dared a peek into Janna's bedroom and closets, but didn't find anything particularly out of the ordinary. The floor-to-ceiling bookshelves covering the walls of Janna's room gave the impression of sleeping in a library, but the nightstands and dresser were tastefully decorated with English floral arrangements, as were the available surfaces of the living room and bathroom. Contemporary paintings furnished the living room, apparently all by the same artist, depicting different scenes from the banks of a misty forest river.

She finally turned her attention to the small TV resting on a stand next to Janna's computer. Looking in the cabinet underneath it, she was surprised to find an impressive surround-sound setup connected to small speakers mounted on the walls, so unintrusive that she hadn't noticed them at first. There was a single shelf of videocassettes; apparently Janna wasn't much for TV, since from the looks of things, the sound system had to have cost seven or eight times what the TV itself had. Curiously, she turned on the CD player just to see what Janna listened to, and for some reason was not overly surprised to hear the soft lilt of Enya wafting across the room, though she didn't recognize the song.

The VHS tapes caught her eye a moment later. Most of them were unlabeled, apparently blank. One was clearly a recording, "King Arthur: History Channel Special." The last few tape was a yoga instructional video. Having nothing else to do, she decided to try it out; she needed to clear her head anyway. It didn't take her long to find a comfortable rug rolled up under the couch, a wide, soft green square with a Celtic knotwork circle design embroidered in gold.

She spent about an hour on the mat, though she quickly turned the tape off; the instructor was actually worse than Juniper had been. In addition, though she left the music playing softly in the background, she wanted the relative quiet to concentrate. Doing this had brought her thoughts back to Juniper, and from there to Sycamore, and the strange sensation she had felt when running through the woods away from the prison. She felt seeds of it now, and while it was nothing like she had felt that day after talking to Sycamore, she still felt more refreshed at the end of her session than she was at the beginning, though she was no closer to answers to the hundreds of questions milling in her head. She returned to the basement a few minutes later, making sure to put everything away, noting wryly that she was taking better care of Janna's belongings than she ever had her own.

If anything, the exercise equipment was even more useless than it had been before. She did long sets with the maximum weight on every weight machine, and barely felt any burn in her muscles afterwards. She loaded up as many weights on the end of the barbell as would fit, and found that the barbell itself wasn't as up to the task as she was; she got it off the ground effortlessly, but the strain bent the barbell down the middle. Faith gave a wry smile and whistled nonchalantly as she put the weights back on the rack.

Almost at the stroke of six, Janna's car pulled into the parking lot. Wordlessly, Faith hopped in, and they sped off.

"Well, you look like you enjoyed yourself at least," Janna offered.

"I know, I don't even get it," Faith answered. "I've been like, working out for almost twelve hours, and I'm not even really tired."

"You're getting stronger," Janna observed.

"I guess. I have no idea how, though. It's not like I was really working out that much in prison, you know."

Janna smiled. "Slayers have more sources of power than their muscles, you know."

Faith nodded. She didn't reply, but she had been beginning to see that for some time now.

Janna decided to change the subject before the air got too heavy to breathe. "Feel like a shopping trip? Or are malls too girly for Slayers?"

"Hey, aren't you a little worried that someone will recognize me? Some people have to be thinking I came back to L.A. after I got out. I've been on the news over the last few days, you know."

Janna gave another secretive smile. "I wouldn't worry about it. I wouldn't have left you at the exercise room if I thought anyone would notice, either. People might have noticed the size of the weights you were using, but I'll bet no one even said anything if they did."

"Actually, no one really came close enough to notice, but what are you talking about?"

"There was a little bit of magic involved," Janna admitted. "Does that freak you out at all?" Faith shook her head. Why would it? One of her best friends had been a demonic sorcerer.

"OK, it's called a Faerie Cloak," Janna continued. "It's an old Irish Gypsy spell, from a long time back. Basically, it lets people see you, but it prevents them from realizing who they're seeing."

"So like, everyone won't really see me?"

"No, they'll see you. They just won't think anything of it. They'll see just another girl shopping. They won't connect it to the face they've seen on the news."

Janna smiled and nodded. Faith thought that she felt a slight change in the air, but couldn't tell anything else was different until Janna said, "There we go. Done. Just don't hit anyone or anything, OK?" she added. "It's pretty delicate. If you do anything to really attract attention, it'll break. Got me?"

Faith nodded. It made sense, in an unreal kind of way. Still, she was a little annoyed that she had somehow not noticed whatever spell Janna apparently had cast on her. Instinctive distrust flared up in her mind, that Janna could just as easily cast something else on her without her knowing, but she repressed it. The raven-haired woman had already had more than enough chances to do that.

"So what do you need at the mall?" Faith asked after an awkward silence.

"Me? Nothing. I don't have enough clothes for the two of us forever, though, you know. Besides, I think it's about time you got something you could appear in public in again, don't you?"

* * *

"Oh my gosh, Janna, I don't care if you're secretly the Wicked Witch of the West, I owe you my life!" Faith joked as she pushed open the door of Janna's apartment with her knee. Neither she nor Janna had any arms free, and it would be at least two more trips to the car before they got everything in the door.

"Don't worry about it," Janna answered demurely. "I'd hate to think the only reason you're sticking around is because I took you shopping, though." Her voice was friendly, though, and Faith simply shrugged it off. She was amazed at how much better at that she had become.

"Well, I'd hate to think you were secretly the Wicked Witch, too, so let's just not let each other down, 'K?" she quipped on her way out to get another load.

She found herself wondering exactly how much Janna's new job paid. She had never concerned herself overmuch with money, though of course, she had never had much of her own. She was not a complete idiot when it came to numbers, though, and even with Janna paying for everything, Faith was still conscious of the amount they had spent today. She had been hoping she could get Janna to maybe shell out for a few clearance-rack items at JC Penney's and maybe something a little looser to fight in. Apparently Janna had other things in mind. The woman had to have put almost two thousand dollars on her credit card that day, if not more, and almost all of it was on clothing and accessories for Faith. Faith doubted she had ever spent that much on herself, barring rent, in a given year. Add that to the fact that Janna had just bought herself a new Porsche and still had to be dealing with whatever expenses were involved in moving into her apartment, and Faith was sure that what she had spent in the last few weeks was more than many people made in a year. Once she started thinking about it, she remembered that even Janna's computer and most of the appliances in her apartment were almost brand new. It was really as though the woman had appeared out of nowhere just a couple months ago.

The more she thought about it, the more Faith's eyes narrowed. That would have been at almost the same time Buffy had died. Faith trusted Janna as much as she had ever trusted anyone she had known for so short a time, but that was not saying much. And all trust aside, Faith had learned a long time ago not to believe in coincidence.

She shrugged out of her reverie and realized that she was just standing by the Boxter, staring at the bags she was supposed to be bringing in. Janna was probably wondering what was keeping her. She gathered up another armload of bags and started up the stairs to the apartment.

She reminded herself that she had never sensed anything dangerous or deceitful about Janna yet, and the woman had tried to be as open as possible with her. That lack of warning in the back of her mind was something she had never experienced even with Mayor Wilkins. If the woman was hiding anything, she was hiding it both deep and well. The thought that she was hiding something, though, wouldn't vanish from Faith's mind. Then again, Faith imagined that she herself was probably hiding some things, even without even knowing or intending to do so.

Janna was clearing out the living room closet when Faith reentered the apartment, making room for Faith's new wardrobe. Janna's own clothes, evicted from the closet, were scattered all over the bed. She gave Faith a warm smile as the rogue Slayer came through the door. "If I'd known I was going to have a guest so soon, I'd have gotten a bigger place," she laughed.

Faith simply smiled wordlessly in response and went out to pick up the last load of clothes from the car.

After everything had been put away, Janna lingered around in the living room. It was plain that she wanted to start talking about something, probably something more serious; she was just unsure of where to begin. Faith sat back on the bed and gave her a questioning look, trying to encourage her not to be nervous; after all, she was definitely interested in whatever the woman had to say, whether or not she was hiding anything and whatever it was that might be.

A few moments later, Janna blew out a tense breath, ruffling her bangs. "You hungry at all?" she asked, apparently not ready to dive right in to whatever it was she wanted to say.

"Sorta," Faith answered. That was a black lie. She was famished. The only thing she had had all day were a bagel and several trips to the water fountain; Janna had not wanted to stop by the food court at the mall, or at any of the restaurants near any of the other shops they had gone to that evening.

"All right," Janna answered, sounding almost relieved. She headed over to the open country-style kitchenette that opened off of the living room. She was back moments later, bearing a large bowl of fresh garden salad, a few plums, and a pitcher of ice water.

"I should have let you stop to eat somewhere," Janna apologized as she set the food down on the coffee table, which had been pushed to one side of the bed when Janna folded out the couch. "I keep forgetting that not everyone's a vegetarian now. If you stick around here for a while, I'll pick up some cold cuts or something next time I'm at the store."

Faith grinned. "It's OK, really, I'll survive," she assured her. Considering what she had been living on for the past year, what Janna had set before her looked like a royal banquet. There had been something in what she said, though, that added to the list in Faith's mind. There had been something in the way her mysterious benefactor had said, 'not everyone's a vegetarian now.'

Faith decided she was going to have to put it on the table sooner or later, so she decided it might as well be sooner.

"Was everyone a vegetarian where you come from or something?" she asked.

Janna looked up, a hint of surprise showing on her face, but no more. Then she sighed. "Betrayed by my food," she sighed. "I need to get the hang of living again."

"What are you talking about?" Faith asked, a touch of frustration entering her voice. She didn't like it when people tried to evade her questions; in addition, while she didn't feel truly threatened, Janna's response had made her more nervous than she had yet felt in the woman's presence.

Janna did not answer immediately. When she did, she apparently changed the subject. "Have you ever felt like someone's given you a fresh chance at life? Maybe one you didn't deserve?"

Faith was still angry that Janna was dodging her question, but that question caught her off guard, and struck dangerously close to her heart. Janna did not appear to be trying to permanently change the subject, however. Slowly, Faith's frustration subsided somewhat.

"Ever since Angel," she answered honestly.

Janna nodded. "I think Angel feels that way himself sometimes, too, or at least he did until about three months ago."

"And you?" Faith pressed. The woman was probably right about Angel, but that was a conversation for another time.

Janna settled into her computer chair. "And me," she answered, in a way that didn't answer anything.

"Only your second chance must've only started about three months ago," Faith prodded.

Janna nodded.

"So what's the deal?" Faith asked, a little of the frustration creeping back into her voice.

Janna stood up. "Maybe I should just show you," she said.

"Hey, hey, nothing witchy now!" Faith answered heatedly.

"No, it's nothing like that," Janna answered. "Though it may freak you out just as much."

"Then why can't you just tell me?" Faith asked.

"Please, just trust me," Janna answered earnestly. "It'll be better this way. I promise. I'll be right back." With that, Janna turned and drifted into the bedroom. Faith followed her as far as the doorway. Janna rustled around under her bed for a moment and pulled out a cardboard box, wrinkled with age. From this, she drew out a thin hardback book, and brought it back out into the living room. Faith drew back onto the foldout bed as Janna approached, and Janna came with her, foregoing her computer chair. She lay back on her back across the head of the bed, and tossed the book in front of Faith, who was sitting Indian-style at the foot.

Faith's eyes widened when she saw it. It wasn't magic, that was for sure. It was a Sunnydale High School yearbook from the year before Faith had enrolled.

"What's this?" Faith asked.

"Look at page twelve," Janna answered.

Puzzled, Faith flipped the book open to that page. It was the first page of the section with pictures of all the faculty. Faith didn't see anything out of the ordinary, until one picture drew her attention. There was a woman staring at her out of the page that could easily be the woman lying on the bed next to her. She held up the picture for Janna to see. "Is this you?" she asked.

Janna didn't even lift her arm from where she had laid it across her eyes, much less lift her head. She just nodded.

Faith took another look at the picture. Janna had aged well, that was for sure. She looked almost exactly like her picture from four years ago. With most people, that would have led Faith to suspect vampirism, but she had been out with Janna since well before sunset, and Janna was far from a crispy critter.

"Now look at the second to last page," Janna said.

Faith did as directed, and her eyes widened in stunned amazement. She catapulted off the bed and across the room with a startled cry, though she somehow managed to keep the book with her. Janna did not even move until Faith landed; then she simply sat up and sat on the bed, waiting for Faith to say something.

Faith, meanwhile, stole another look at the book to make sure she had not misread anything.

The second-last page of the memory book was a two-page spread montage of the woman on the bed across from her. At the top of the first page, in bold calligraphy, were written the words, "IN LOVING MEMORY," and at the bottom of the second, underneath a portrait of the woman, "JENNY CALENDAR."


* * * * *


COMING SOON: Chapter 6, "Stories of Bygone Days." In subsequent chapters (these may not all fit into one): Janna begins to fill Faith in on what happened to her; the Scoobies continue to fill Buffy in on what she accomplished between her first and second deaths; Glory learns that Faith escaped the Order of Turaca; Willow begins to use magic more assertively, prompting notice from several watchful eyes; and much more!

In case it hasn't shown by now, I'm an addict of the older seasons of Buffy and have been working on a plotline complex enough to bring as many old school characters back as possible. My apologies for the length of this chapter; several sections of it were cut and pasted from scattered works that I've had lying around since early 2001, and I didn't realize how long it was getting and didn't feel like cutting it. Subsequent chapters will almost certainly not be this long, though overall, this story is definitely shaping up to be an epic; whether it will be a good epic or a doggedly boring and long-winded ramble is up for you, dear reader, to decide.

As always, classes are torture, so it may be a long time between updates. I shouldn't be working on this as much as I am ... but it's just so much more fun than schoolwork. As always, feedback is appreciated, the more specific the better!