Buffy marched with a new sense of rhythm toward Tara's room. A quick check and change of clothes in her own dorm room had revealed a trail as bright as noon.
Willow didn't even bother to make the bedwhich means they probably didn't get a lot of research in she thought with a rueful smile.
The thought of the two witches still having sex in Tara's room had made her hesitate momentarily, but there was a mantra developing in her head. A chant.
It had started with the words from the dream. back before Dawn but she knew the end of that phrase now. The punctuation. back before Dawn...dies. so it had become a new chant.
Get back to Dawn. Get back to Dawn.
It had started in that terrible hospital room and grown louder and more insistent as she closed the distance to her old friend. As if talking to Faith had helped her distill her conflicting thoughts down to one crystalline resolve:
Back to Dawn.
As if the dark Slayer was speaking to her from someplace deeper and farther away. Telling her about the future in some unspoken language. Or maybe it was the dream with all of its awful urgency. And it was starting to make sense to her. Not in a rational, point A to point B to point C kind of way, but in a deep down gut-level way.
A Faith way.back before She thought and actually stopped in the hallway. Okay, I must have caught something in that hospital. Some kind of dementia....
Despite her newfound confidence she still hadn't managed to decode the dream. Dawn in danger seemed obvious enough. And Faithwell, her impromptu trip to the hospital was almost certainly tied into that. But her cryptic remarks about Slayers not being fixers. And the whole three-way wedding. What was up with that?
Okay, you're not going to figure this out by lurking around in the hallway.
Another flight of stairs, ten yards and she was standing in front of Tara's door. And she realized with sudden panic that there was a good possibility she was interrupting a major wiccan smoochies session. But a quick listen at the door let her know that the two women were up and talking softly in conversational tones. Flirty and sweet tones, but not overtly sexual.
Lurk much?
Swallowing hard she knocked gently and heard Willow's muffled, "It's probably Buffy." But she wasn't prepared for the sight that greeted her. The door opened to reveal Tara, young and beautiful and so different from the picture of the blonde witch she kept in her mind.
But stillTara. Here and alive. The image from the dream of a blood-soaked shirt flashed in her mind and she felt tears spring to her eyes.
"H-hi Buf-" Before she could stop herself Buffy had enveloped the shy blonde in a rib-cracking embrace. "Oh, um."
"Hey Buf, no breaking the girlfriend," she heard Willow say somewhere off to her right. With a laugh, Buffy released her death-grip on Tara and wiped clumsily at her eyes.
"Ohsorry. I just," she turned to find Willow seated cross-legged on the floor in front of some kind of psychedelic disco ball. "Is sheI meandoes she know?"
A gentle nod from Willow. "Everything."
She turned her attention back to the blonde who was smiling shyly as she shuffled nervously from foot to foot. "I'm so sorry TaraI forgot you don't really know mein this now. It's just..." She paused momentarily worried that Willow didn't mean everything. Had she really told Tara? The two witches exchanged a look full of sadness and meaning and she knew. Willow had told her. Everything. "I just missed youI mean, we all do. Then."
Tara blushed crimson, her eyes darting around the room. "Oh, um, I" She finally met the Slayer's gaze with that crooked smile. "It's okay. I-I'm just s-so glad we'ref-friends. In the f-future I mean." She studied her clasped hands, her forehead furrowing in frustration. "That m-m-means a lot to m-mer-really."
"It means a lot to me too," she said softly and reached out to squeeze the blonde's arm gently. There was so much she wanted to say to Tara. Apologies and explanations. But how could she? This Tara didn't know about the small things that had lead them to that future she was so desperate to return to. A future without the gentle blonde in it.
And how do you say you're sorry for letting someone die anyway?
Buffy studied her intently with all of her senses, taking in everything about her just as she had found herself doing with her mother. As if she was trying to imprint everything about the two women indelibly on her consciousness. Or maybe as if she was looking for signs of blame.
The Slayer inside inevitably recorded and analyzed the obvious signs of submission. The hunched shoulders, down-turned eyes and averted gaze that spoke of the abuse she had only ever guessed at. The Slayer recognized all the signs of submission, of a non-alpha dog, but there was something else that registered again in a deeper place. She had always considered girls like Tara to be weak — easy prey. And she had assumed that the toughness Tara had developed over the years was a result of battling demons with the Scoobies. But as she studied the shy smiling girl before her, a girl who knew the terrible details of her own death, she saw with a thunderclap of clarity the immeasurable strength of this girl. Tara was stronger than all of them. Always had been.
"WellI r-r-really should g-go," the blonde managed finally, squirming under Buffy's gaze. "Y-you knoww-w-work and all." She finished with a nervous shrug and looked over at Willow with something like desperate indecision.
"Hello!" Her best friend's familiar voice rang out. "There will be no leaving without major smooches or I will be forced to get my pout on."
Buffy almost laughed at the expression on the blonde's face. Red was just not a big enough word for the color of her cheeks. And she was nervously looking back and forth between the redhead and the Slayer. Finally with a beaming smile she crossed the room and kneeled down to the redhead. Buffy found something very interesting to look at on the bookshelf and wondered why her face was suddenly hot.
After a painfully awkward good-bye hug with Tara, Buffy was finally alone in the room with Willow. With a deep breath, she forced her mind back to the problem at hand. The reason for her visit. She dropped to the floor to face the redhead and gasped when she saw her face. There were dark circles under her eyes and her gaze was unfocused and glassy. It seemed to take enormous energy for her to open her eyes and return the Slayer's gaze.
"Um, Wilno offense, but you look kinda"
The redhead nodded slightly and winced. "Do you think Tara noticed?" She couldn't answer the question. There was no right answer. There was the truth which was an emphaticyes' and there was what her friend needed to hear. Willow nodded with a pained expression and looked down at her hands. "Yeah," she said softly and sighed.
Buffy's eyes were drawn to the floating sphere, which was now actively giving her the wiggins. There was definitely some magic-y something going on with the disco ball.
"It's a kind of a map," the redhead explained without any prompting. "Of the spell andother things."
"So you found out what's going on with the device and everything," she said excitedly and the mantra began again.
Back to Dawn. Back to Dawn
But Mom
"Actually, it was Tara," Willow began, her voice shaking and the Slayer wondered if it was fear or fragility. "She knew about it, which is kinda strange in itself," she paused to catch her breath. This was not right. Okay, willow should definitely be a little tired after what was obviously a night of sex, but thisthis was wrong. The girl she had left the day before was healthy and full of Willow energy. This girl was deathly pale and weak. "It's called Occum's Heart," she extended a shaking hand to point to a book at the end of the bed. "There's an illustration in that."
Buffy reached for the book and found a crude illustration of the thingy that had brought them here. And a lengthy, but ultimately useless description underneath. The same story of a lover lost that Willow had told her in the room. Before. "Soas usual this uses a lot of words to say absolutely nothing." She pushed the book aside and smiled at her friend. "What does it do?"
"Well, Tara says that from what she's read it was made to give people a second chance at something.you know, kind of a do-over' that changes things.the futurebut no one really knows for sure."
A second chance "Oh. So we're here so you can have a second chance to see Tara"
"No," Willow interrupted, her voice hoarse and weak. "Not my second chance. You cast the spell remember? I'm not even supposed to be here, but when I cast a spell to stop it, our magics got all mixed up andvoila."
"So, how I meanbut I didn't want a second chance at anything. I mean I don't think" she trailed off struggling to remember the events of that evening. Dawn at Rain's houseand the confrontation with Faith in the Rain's front yard.
There was her mother. That was a given. And there was nothing to do over except every moment she had ever spent with her mom.
"Well, it's more complicated now" the redhead began and trailed off, glancing quickly at the floating sphere. There was something she wasn't telling her. She knew the way secrets felt. They were the atmosphere and oxygen of their lives, in the future.
But this wasn't the future.
Make it rightnow.
"Wil, what's going on?" she asked softly.
Willow choked back a sob, but her lip quivered uncontrollably. "It'swe're not supposed to be herestill. My magic is" she grew silent and Buffy watched tears roll down her face.
"Your magic is keeping us here?" Buffy asked gently and the redhead nodded.
"It's sucking energy from me to keep us here." She smiled a thin smile. "Thus the sickliness on my part."
"So you can just release your spell and we'll be back"
"It's more complicated than that," the redhead began and then stopped. Buffy closed her eyes and drew in a long breath. It was going to take all of her willpower not to scream at Willow. Because there was definitely something else going on here. Something wrong because it should have been simple. Willow should stop her spell and the Heart would do its thing and they would be back.
Without Tara. Without Mom.
The realization hit her like a blow to the chest. She couldn't breathe. It was like before when she had been ripped from heaven to be with them. To be with Dawn. But she hadn't had a choice then.
"I won't lose her again," Willow said evenly as if she had read the Slayer's thoughts.
"But Willow we have to go back. Dawn is" her tone was now urgent and panicked.
"You are going back Buffy." Willow reassured her and her smile was so calm and peaceful. Almost innocent. "I'm notI can't live without her.I won't."
There was a long silence as she tried to process her friend's statement. Her eyes wandered to the sphere just over the redhead's shoulder. The beautiful mix of colors and the darkness that seemed to be growing. Spreading through the bright like a deadly infection.
But it was simple. All Willow had to do was let go. Once her energy was gone
Oh god! This time the realization swept over her in an enormous, nauseating wave of desperate anger.
If Willow didn't let go her energy would dissipate until, finally, there was no more spelland no more Willow.
"No!" She was on her feet in an instant, the Slayer within ready for a fight. Ready for violence. "You can'tI won't let you do this Willow." Because this was a threat. A direct threat. And she wasn't going to allow that dark-eyed demon to take away everything again.
She ran quickly through the possibilities. She could threaten Willow. Could force her physically to let go.
The redhead sighed, her forehead creasing. But her eyes, when they opened slowly, were green. "There is no letting me' Buffy," Willow closed her eyes heavily and the Slayer saw the hard pain there etched in deep lines. "Can't you see it's already done?"
They had been actively working on Faith's fucked up idea' for an hour. Dawn downloading file after file from the internet while Xander wired the house and yard. The Slayer had spent a large amount of the time tending to her wounds and eating almost everything in the house.
"Growing girl," she said around a mouthful of M&Ms and Dawn, seeing her chocolate-stained face felt a little better about everything.
"Ever heard of sharing?" she admonished playfully and grabbed a handful of candy.
After pelting the teen with carefully targeted candies the Slayer finally got bored and made her way out into the yard. Dawn watched as she paced the distance between trees and cement casually flipping a sword from one hand to the other in terrifying swirls of lethal metal. One slip, one slight miscalculation and Faith would lose fingers or worse. An arm. With a shudder she tried not to watch. She knew what Faith was doing. The Slayer had explained it to her as testing the balance of each weapon. Which didn't make much sense, but it was more than she would have ever gotten out of her sister. Buffy would have just told her to go clean her room or something.
The files were now raining in fast, so Dawn gave up watching the blue bars make their slow progress and sneaked upstairs. The creep factor definitely increased as she got closer to the room. She could see it now from the end of the hall, but she stopped to take another look at Tara. And her Mom. It was strange and terrifying the things she had forgotten about the two of them. She tried everyday to remember something about both of them, but it got harder. And that just made her feel guilty. And as the dark slayer was trying to teach her, guilt wasn't something she needed right now. She needed to focus on keeping those demons away from the house as long as possible. Away from that room to give Buffy and Willow enough time.
Focus.
It still looked exactly the same. As in completely destroyed. Like a tornado had hit it. And the wailing was louder inside. Standing above the flickering laptop and the metal Heart, it was obvious whose grief-filled yells filled the room. It didn't take Slayer hearing to pick out the unique timbre of Willow's voice.
And she was beginning to understand. Willow. The two suicide attempts. Which was really what all of that end of the world stuff was about. Probably. And something else between Willow and Buffy and Xander that she would never really understand. But she understood the wanting to disappear part. For so long she had felt something slowly erasing a part of herself. The part that held her mother and Tara in it. But it wasn't just the memories that were disappearing, it was the other things too. The feelings and thoughts that made everything better and safe. That was why she spent a few minutes every day trying to remember. Talking to them seemed to help. Seemed to connect her to past
"Buffy, you need to hurry well, we need you here. I mean, I need you here."
She ran a hand through her hair nervously and stared at the broken laptop screen. "And, um, Willow I know I've been kind of" she paused, not sure how to say it all. Even if they couldn't hear her. "Whatever I justI wanted you to know that I think I understanda little."
She felt a familiar presence behind her and jumped.
"Sorry. Didn't mean to scare ya," Faith shifted nervously. "I just thought you might know if Buffy has a secret weapons stash somewhere."
"Yep, under her bed. Next to her diary."
"Her diary?" Faith's eyebrows rose in a half-hearted attempt at her typical playful smirk. "Anything interesting?"
She wanted to play along, to keep the mood light, but the diary and the devastation of that room kept painting everything in muted tones. And the diaryeverything she knew about Faith came from that diary. From Buffy's initial impressions of her that sounded like the jealous scribblings of a teenager, to her sister's growing guilt and rationalization and finally to self-righteous anger. And maybe even hate.
One passage stood out in her mind. It had terrified her when she read it and the words still haunted her:
I tried to kill Faith tonight and I know I should feel bad about it. But I don't.
Not even a little.
There a few lines scratched out in heavy lines of blue ink. Then:
What's happening to me?
She had always believed that her sister was some kind of untouchable icon of good.. like a stone statue of a saint. Until she found that page.
"No. She doesn't write in it anymore. Not since Mom." A frown pinched Dawn's forehead and she knelt to drag the black chest from under the bed to hide her emotions. She had always felt comfortable invading Buffy's private space. They were sisters and it was kind of her duty, but now standing with Faith in the familiar room it just felt like a violation of Buffy's trust.
But what am I supposed to do? I can't be the only one to know these things...
The diary, she discovered, now rested on top of the weapons in the box. Running her fingers over it lightly she thought of her sister's return from death. The girl whose thoughts were too painful and raw to even write down. She extended the diary to Faith and almost cried at the reverent way the dark slayer held it.
Faith studied its worn fabric cover for a moment then swallowed hard. "Thanks, butI don't think I..." She placed it carefully on Buffy's bed and bent down to rifle through the weapons, her forehead deeply lined as she stole occasional glances at the pink cover. Arranging Buffy's favorite weapons carefully around her, the Slayer reached for a shining blade on the bottom and stopped mid-motion. Her hand hovered over the box for several moments and Dawn noticed a slight tremor in the strong spread of her fingers.
"What is it?"
Faith didn't answer. After taking a deep breath she bent to withdraw a cruel-looking double-bladed dagger. It looked rusty near the hilt, which was strange because Buffy was so anal about everything. Especially her weapons.
"Is that paint?" she asked and felt stupid because she knew by the look on Faith's face and the memories that weren't hers what that was. Blood. Faith's blood. And this was that knife. That knife that had changed everything.
The Slayer turned the blade slowly, shaking her head, her eyes growing darker. And Dawn knew she shouldn't, but she couldn't seem to help herself.
"Can I see it? The scar I mean," she asked quietly, but Faith's head snapped back as if she'd been struck. There were a few moments of awkward silence before a sad smile covered the Slayer's face. She nodded and lifted the hem of her shirt with one hand to reveal a jagged purplish, but fading scar near her hip.
Dawn resisted the urge to touch it, to trace its ugly lines with her fingertips. As if that could fill in the gaps of what she didn't know. There were only the fragmented images from Faith's memory and pieces of overheard conversations to tell the story. And the diary. The rest of that confrontation was a secret between Faith and Buffy that no one else could really get close to. Her sister had tried to kill this girl and the proof was written on Faith's body in a jagged red line.
The sound of heavy footsteps on the stairs brought her back from her musings.
"I knew it!" Xander stood in the doorway angrily pointing at Faith. The Slayer quickly pulled her shirt down to cover the scar and lowered the blade. "I knew this was all some bullshit act of yours Faith."
"What now?"
"Spike said he heard from Willy that that thing," he pointed to Willow's room without taking his eyes from the dark Slayer. "Was supposed to be delivered to the Mayor's Slayer. And that would be you." He finished with a sneer. "Since, if I'm not mistaken, you were the Mayor's bitch. Not Buffy."
"I am nobody's bit--"
"What?" Dawn shook her head and turned to Faith. All the angry words in that diary about betrayal ran through her mind as she stared into dark eyes. Had this all been some crazy plot to get rid of Buffy?
"This was all just her way of getting the Heart for herself," he shouted angrily. "Probably so she can go back in time and kill Buffy so the Mayor gets to be big Worm Demon of Sunnydale!"
"That's not" Faith began and then stopped. With a deep breath she turned to Dawn. "It's not like that Dawn. Really. You've gotta believe me."
"Right. Cause the credibility of a convicted felon is so"
"No wait" Dawn began but could only stare at Faith who wasn't denying anything. So that meant she had been there just to get the Heart? All along. "I meanFaith?" her voice broke. If she could have she would have gotten on her knees and pleaded with the Slayer to tell her it wasn't true.
Dark eyes closed tightly and then opened to meet Dawn's. "Okay I did come here to get the Heart. but"
"To use it," Xander interjected hotly and Dawn watched the Slayer's jaw clench. Her knuckles, she noticed, were white around the hilt of the dagger.
"Yes." Faith admitted with a fierce look and Dawn was stricken by an overwhelming wave of nausea. "But not for thatnot to help the Mayor"
"Just to kill Buffy"
"No!" Faith snarled turning the knife in her hand. She looked suddenly terrified as she glanced at the diary on the bed and Dawn wondered what she was afraid of. She had the knife after all. And the slayer strength to back it up. If this was really some revenge plot like Xander was saying. "I thought that if I could just" she became agitated suddenly, her eyes looking inward as she played out some terrible memory. "He just came out of nowherethat guy. Finch." Faith finished with a look of utter helplessness and shook her head. "And I thought, if I could changeyou know what I did that it might fix things" she looked up obviously expecting a biting response from Xander, but he stayed silent crossing his arms. When Faith spoke she spoke to Dawn. "Between Buffy and me."
"Yeah, whatever. I knew we couldn't trust you," Xander muttered low and Dawn wasn't sure what to do. Who to believe. "The first chance you get"
"I don't really care what you think Xander. I could be Mother fucking Theresa and you'd still hate m-" Faith stopped suddenly making a motion for quiet, her head tilted slightly to the left. Dawn noticed that Xander's mouth was still slightly open in an aborted retort.
"Wha-?" But a quick frown from the Slayer made her shut her mouth. Faith's dark eyes were now scanning the shadows of the front yard, a grim smile slowly forming on her lips.
"Showtime." Faith said with another sad smile and Dawn swallowed the fear that was tearing through her like a storm. The yard was black and empty to her eyes, but she knew that on this thing to trust the Slayer. And that meant there were demons crawling toward the house under that blanket of dark. "Ready to be superheroes?" Faith asked gently as she tucked that terrible blade into its scabbard and fitted it into the waistband of her jeans.
All Dawn could think was, no. No. I'm not ready. Yet. How is anyone ever ready for this?