OK. I'm really really sorry about the length of time I've been writing this. I've had absolutely no idea how to continue this for so long. This chapter's a little different because this is just the way it turned out. I hope you like it. Many apologies once again.
Chapter 12
Faith had known that Buffy was dead even before Wesley had delivered the news to her. She had shared a link with Buffy, although she only realised this after the slayer's second demise. She had not felt it before but she knew that it was missing. Her calling had been a difficult time, everything had seemed new and so it figured that she might overlook this bond completely – she wasn't sure if Buffy had ever felt anything. She had never hinted to Faith that it might exist or that she even knew about it, maybe she had just grown used to it being there or maybe she denied sharing anything with the dark slayer.
"Ah…Faith…" Wesley had said almost as if he had been hoping someone else would appear in her place. His gaze had been set on her yet focused at something beyond her. His discomfort had been clear and it had been obvious he hadn't known where to start – not because the subject was a hard one but because it was her he was addressing.
"Buffy?" All she had wanted was simple confirmation of the few images the powers that be had passed into her already troubled dreams. A building site. A tower. Familiar faces upturned in shock. A graceful swan dive. Nothing. A blank void in Faith's being that she just knew the former slayer had occupied.
"Dead." And that was the extent of their conversation. He had hung up the stained and faded plastic phone and she had followed suit and then, for a moment they had both looked at each other and had seemed to understand. Then Wesley was gone and life for Faith had continued to the extent it could in a maximum security prison. Each day had passed just as the last. Until this one.
It was long since passed lights out but Faith was up and pacing at the bars of her cell like a caged animal. This was how she had spent the first few weeks of her sentence, pacing, unable to sleep, muscles aching for some proper action. But after a while she had put into practice the meditations her first watcher had taught her and gradually she had quieted her primal need to slay. But the moment that Dawn had stepped through the event horizon she had set things in motion. Faith's blood had begun to hunger, starved for so long of her nocturnal life. It had begun in the early morning, she had started to thirst for a fight but had managed to stay out of trouble. In the afternoon she had needed to let off steam in the small exercise yard. And now…
She weakened suddenly and without warning. She felt behind her for the concrete reassurance of the cell wall and leaned against it. A few brief images appeared in her head. Stars, flashing past her dizzyingly. Blue liquid? A grey room. Soldiers. When the images stopped she was not left with nothing. She felt something spark inside her and flicker back to life.
"Holy shit!" she said a little too loudly. She wondered how it was possible, she'd seen some strange things, but this? Somehow, somewhere, Buffy Summers was alive.
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