AN: Dedicated to my troll. Enjoy Jason!

FIC: Daddy Dearest (12?)

"So I said -," Xander's voice trailed off when Dana's eyes went from sparkling to hard in an instant, her gaze snapping towards the canteen's doorway. Xander glanced in the direction Dana was staring. "Oh crap," he muttered as he noted the tautness to his girl-friend's face and her normally full lips set in a thin, hard line. Turning back, he saw a now snarling Dana rising. Thinking quickly, he spoke in a mutter, hoping Angel's vampire hearing picked up his words from across the crowded room. "Deadboy, get to Faith quickly." Standing, he stepped into Dana's way. "Sit down."

"Faith hurt," the brunette growled. As usual in times of stress, her speech patterns collapsed, making her sound like the Hulk's way hotter, but at this distance far scarier, younger sister. "Bad man hurt her. Need help."

"Xan-."

"Shut up Deadboy Jnr.," he snapped at Connor, his eye not shifting from the beautiful teen in front of her. "Dana," he softened his voice. "You can help Faith by sitting down and staying calm."

"No," Dana shook her head vigoursly for emphasis. "Go to big sis."

"Oh yeah?" Xander swallowed as he raised an eyebrow. "You want to go to Faith you'll have to go through me. And what do you think she'll think of that?"

Dana glared at him. "Hate you," she spat.

Xander hid a wince, he hated people hating him. It was probably the reason he'd let Buffy and Willow get away with so much, a fear of being alone. "You don't mean that," he said evenly. "Now, sit down."

The Slayer glared at him before spinning around and stomping back to their table, dropping into her seat beside a bemused looking Connor. "What was all that about?"

"I don't know," Xander replied for glancing over his shoulder to see how Faith and Deadboy were going.

"She did that, my girl?"

Angel half-smiled at O'Neill's pride, a father's pride, as he told the story of Angelus' run-in in with Faith. "She did that," he confirmed.

"She must really care about you to risk herself like that," the middle-aged man's face shadowed. "I doubt she'll ever care about me." The soldier shook his head. "Not that I deserve it."

"Faith has a lot of defences but if you get past them you'll won't find a more loyal person," Angel comforted. "She's been forgiven for a lot of things and has forgiven people for a lot of stuff."

"Yeah," the man's eyes turned stony. "Speaking of which I'll have to remember to send Ms. Summers my regards and a polite suggestion about how the hell a leader should treat those under her command."

Angel hid a wince, regretting his candour with the colonel. "Buffy made some mist-."

"A few mistakes?" he was struck by intensity of the soldier's glare. "From what you've said, that damn cheerleader left my daughter in a crappy third-rate hotel while she happily led her whitebread life. A leader looks after the troops under their command. Not that I don't blame Giles too, but it's obvious that Summers shoved him aside as leader, otherwise your ass would be dust. Summers seemed to have one concern and one only – you."

"I think you're being unfair," Angel struggled to keep hold of his temper.

"I give you credit for saving her," the air force officer growled. "But has it ever occurred to you if the others hadn't been dealing with her concealing your return, they might have given Faith the care she needed?"

For a second Angel was knocked off balance by the soldier's words, pushing his mind down an unexplored avenue. Even as he opened his mouth to defend himself, he heard Xander's mutter cutting through the canteen chatter. "Deadboy, get to Faith quickly."

Quelling his distaste at both the nickname and Xander's commanding tone, he looked up. His stomach hollowed at the wild-eyed look in the brunette beauty's soulful eyes, taking him back to a dreary LA. alley four years ago. And that almost had ended very badly, Faith had no idea how dangerous she really was.

"What's up Angel?" O'Neill glanced in the direction he was. Seeing Faith, the Colonel began to rise.

Angel's hand snapped up to grab the soldier's shoulder. "No offence Colonel," he said. "But only me and Xander can get through to her when she looks like that." He didn't need to add that the Colonel was probably the reason she looked like that.

O'Neill stared after the vampire as the Irish demon hurried towards the gorgeous Bostonian who was his daughter, his heart tightening in jealous pain. It should be him that was comforting her, not Angel. "Damn it," he muttered, his voice hoarse with pain. All he wanted was a chance, a chance to make up for all the bad stuff, to see her smile at him the way she smiled at Xander, Dana, or Angel, for him to make her eyes sparkle with laughter.

But that wasn't going to happen any time soon.

"Are you alright O'Neill?"

He sighed and turned to Teal'C. "Tell me Teal'C, do the Jaffa use relationship counselling?" he sighed at his friend's puzzled expression. "No, that's what I figured." Turning, he saw both his daughter and Angel had disappeared. "Damn it."

Faith slowed in her advance when her mentor intercepted her. "Hey Faith."

"Fang," Faith attempted to step around the vampire only for him to block the way. She glared up at the demon. "Look," she forced a smile. "I just wanna do some father-daughter bonding with dearest daddy over there."

Angel raised an inscrutable eyebrow. "Why do I doubt that?"

"'Cause the demon side of you makes you all nasty and suspicious," Faith tried for levity but in her current mood, she sucked more than Angelus on a feeding binge.

"Faith," Angel sighed. "Don't even. I know you, I know when something's eating you. Why don't we talk about it?"

Faith clenched her fists together, wanting to punch the demon. But she couldn't, this was Angel, her saviour. She could never fight him. "Fine," she gritted her teeth together. "But not here."

"Your room?" Angel proposed.

Faith's answering grin was a little more sincere. "Why Angel," she purred. "I just bet you've been waiting years for an invite to my room." Her laugh at Angel's theatrical eye roll died when she caught sight of her father. Bastard. "Let's go."

Angel stared at the Slayer sat curled on the bed. Sometimes all he could see was her power and her toughness, and forgot underneath all that there was a troubled young woman, little more than a girl really, who'd had a truly horrific childhood, who'd been told all her life she was bad, evil, worthless, and was constantly fighting against that brainwashing. But it was times like this, and the desolate look on her otherwise beautiful face that reminded him. "Are you going to talk or do I have to guess?"

Faith pulled her head up from between her knees. "What?"

Angel was shocked to see the tears rolling down the brunette beauty's face. He almost moved forward to take her in his arms but resisted, knowing it had to be Faith who asked for him otherwise she might react badly. "What's wrong?" he asked softly, the anguish in the Slayer's pool-like eyes wrenching at his heart.

His protégée looked to the ground. "G..growing up, I was so alone. No one wanted their kids to be near the daughter of the local ho," Faith shook her head, the sadness in that simple gesture gut-wrenching. "No, that wasn't even the reason, my mom was a ho, but she was worse. She was wicked unpredictable. One second, we could be laughing at cartoons or some shit on tv, the next I'm on the floor holding my mouth as she screams about having to buy groceries to feed me, money she could have spent on some horse or booze." Angel was unable to prevent a growl from escaping, it was a shame that Faith's mom was dead; he wouldn't mind spending a few hours 'discussing' her treatment of Faith with her.

Faith appeared not to have heard his snarl as she continued. "Worse thing wasn't my mom though. Or even her boyfriends. Until," the brunette shrugged, "later at least." Angel momentarily morphed out as his demon threatened to take control. Again, lost in the bitter memories of the past, Faith appeared not to notice. "No," the Slayer shook her head again. "It was worse being so alone, having no one to be my friend." The raven-haired beauty looked up, her eyes shining with as yet unshed tears. "But I wasn't alone, I had a kid brother."

"Uh?" Now Angel was completely and utterly lost. Faith had never mentioned him before.

Faith's smile at his confusion was tremulous at best. "O'Neill's," Faith practically spat her biological father's name, "pet alien, Thor took me to see the shit he's done, try and impress with him. So I'm in this room, seeing images from my pop's past, and I see this little kid taking O'Neill's gun and blowing his fucking brains out." Faith's shoulders began to shake. "He was my fucking brother and I never got to meet him 'cause of that bastard."

Suddenly the Slayer was sobbing wildly, Angel guessed her tears were as much for her own-never childhood as her dead half-brother. Quelling his earlier trepidation about Faith's reluctance to rely on other people, he crossed the room in a second and pulled her towards him. "Shh. It's all right. It's okay. I'm here. I'm right here. Shh." Angel whispered as he held the Slayer in his arms, allowing her to sob onto his shirt, unconsciously echoing the words he'd used when he'd saved her in a LA. alley.

O'Neill paced his room, worry about Faith eating up his insides. "Please O'Neill, this is a small space, your continual movement is making my vision swim."

He stopped and looked at the room's other occupant. "Is that your unique way of telling me I'm making you dizzy?"

His companion gave him one of his customary half-nods, apparently unfazed by his testiness. "Indeed."

"Sorry," he threw his hands up in despair. "I just want to know what's wrong with Faith."

"Perhaps I can help," he looked over his shoulder to see a grim-faced Giles stood in the doorway of the room. There was more than a little about this man that made him wary, told him that this was not a man to cross. And that was without taking into account his personal army of ass-kicking super-amazons. "May I?" he nodded at the Englishman. After a second the man walked in. "Perhaps," Giles glanced at his companion, "we should speak alone?"

Teal'c started to rise, but he waved him back down. "Anything you want to say to me, you can say in front of my friend."

"As you wish." Giles glanced at Teal'C before speaking. "I understand you had a son."

Jack felt his heart tighten. "Charlie, so?"

"This is delicate," again the Englishman glanced towards Teal'C.

"Just talk damn it!"

The Englishman didn't even blink at his growl. "As you wish. Thor spoke to Faith earlier, showed her some images from your past, an attempt to show her what sort of man you are."

"Oh?"

"Unfortunately," now the Watcher looked nervous. "In amongst the images Thor showed her was one of Charlie dying."

"Oh god," Jack slumped onto his bunk, the strength leaving his legs.

There was a long silence, eventually broken by the Englishman. "Might I ask what happened? If that wouldn't be intruding?"

O'Neill answered mechanically, his mind already caught up in reminiscences of that fateful day. "Charlie had come home with a lousy report card, but he wanted to play ball. I told him no, he had to study more. I went out to garden, he wanted to be like me, a soldier, so he went into my guns cabinet. I heard a shot. My wife had always said I shouldn't have a gun in the house."

"Oh, good lord," came the whispered comment from the Englishman. "You mustn't blame yourself Colonel."

"Indeed, O'Neill." Teal'C agreed. "The Watcher is correct."

"I have to see her, explain." Even as he spoke he was up, moving to the door.

The Englishman blocked his path. "Given Faith's current mood, such a move would be unwise." He made to step around the Watcher. "Colonel O'Neill, Xander and Angel are with her now. And when she is in a mood like she currently is," the Englishman's face shadowed. "They are the only two men she'll consent to listen to as I found earlier to my cost."

"Sorry?"

"I tried to intercede on your behalf before we left on this," the Englishman looked around, "wondrous machine." The Watcher's face shadowed. "I was left in no doubt that she has certain understandable issues with me because of the past. Issues I thought buried. You trying to go her now, might cause irreparable damage to your relationship."

O'Neill stared at the Englishman. "What relationship?" he asked bitterly.