Disclaimer: The characters featured here do not belong to me. They are the intellectual and legal property of Roger Price, Thames Television, ITV, Joss Whedon, and Mutant Enemy.
John shoved his hands in his pockets and stared down at the simple gravestone with a heavy sadness. His cousin was dead; this wasn't what he'd come back to earth to find.
"Wesley," John shook his head and whispered in the wind, "You should have walked away from it, like my father did, like I did. You didn't have to end up like this. I thought you were smarter than that."
"English was smart. Way smart. But his old man didn't get that either." The girl startled John, peeling out of the shadows like a wraith. Wild dark hair blowing around her face, eyes old and young, hard and soft at the same time. "Who the hell are you?"
John ignored the rudeness of the question from the young American. "You knew Wesley?" He asked the question although he already knew the answer. The way the girl moved, silent and stealthy reminding him of tiger on the prowl. Or rather, in this case, a tigress protecting her cubs. Knowing the world that his father left behind, the world that he forbid John to be a part of, and later fate and destiny and his gifts as a Tomorrow Person left no chance of that happening, John knew precisely what she was.
She paused, eyes narrowing to glare at him. Evidently she didn't take well to being ignored. "I asked you first. How'd you know English?"
English. That was the second time she referred to Wesley by that name. It added more complexity to the question of her rather than adding any insight into John's niggling sense of curiosity.
"This is a family plot," John pointed out, ever the air of politeness. "I could ask you to leave, Miss –"
Eye brows raised, face softened, tongue darted out to lick bright painted red lips. Something of a challenge flashed in her eyes, "What if I told you it was Missus?"
John doubted it. Uncle Roger may have been tight lipped about many things, but he certainly would have voiced his opinion if Wesley had married the young woman standing defiantly before John now. Not that it was a line Wesley would have crossed; that would have been one of the first things the Council drilled into him and Uncle Roger had always had a way of making certain everyone around the man walked the lines that Roger Wyndham Price wanted them to walk.
In answer, John merely held her gaze. He wouldn't lie and say it wasn't unnerving doing so, standing in the family cemetery exchanging silent glares with a young woman whose entire being radiated danger and destruction barely constrained.
The Council's weapon against the darkness.
"Faith," she said finally, using black lacquered nails to push the wayward strands of hair from her face. In a single stride, she was on top of his great-grandparents vault, landing with cat like grace. She seemed a bit disappointed that he chose not to display any surprise or appreciation at her physical feat. "So, you a long lost uncle or something?"
John self-consciously touched the hair at his temples and immediately drew his hand away. "No. I'm . . . Wesley is – was – my cousin."
Faith considered that for a moment. Then, sharp, cutting, "You missed the funeral cos."
It took John a moment to make sense of her words. "I know but I'm here now."
-- End --