Title: Her First Mistake
Author: Restive Nature (aka Bavite)
Rating: PG13 for violence and swearing
Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy The Vampire Slayer characters, nor do I own characters or settings from Dark Angel. They belong respectively to Joss Whedon and Cameron/ Eglee.
Timeline: Post series for Buffy and late season 2 for DA, after the episode "The Berrisford Agenda".
Pairing: Faith/ Alec, though not in the way you'd expect.
Summary: The fury of Faith.
6 months earlier
His eyes had been green.
His father's name was Jack.
She had wanted to call him Matthew.
But that hadn't been her right.
Faith's eyes darted around the room as these thoughts flitted through her mind. They came fast and furious and she was shaking before she realized it. The telephone in her hand banged against her chin as the room began to swim.
"Ma'am?" came the disembodied voice through the telephone. The voice that had identified itself as Detective Allen Stewart, from the Seattle Police Department, sounded slightly worried, mostly resigned. Faith realized that this guy must have to do this a lot. It probably wasn't the best part of his job.
Faith tried to speak. She tried to reassure the detective that she was still there. It wasn't until she felt the chilled hand of her best friend; some would say her only true friend, slide over her shoulder in a gesture of comfort.
"Faith?" Angel asked quietly. He'd given her a measure of privacy by moving to the other room in his apartment, but some innate sense of trouble had brought him back to her side.
Faith glanced up at the ensoulled Vampire. She was so completely out of her element right then, but somehow, having Angel by her side helped. She knew that she could figure this out if he was there to help. Just like always. She moistened her lips and returned her attention to the phone call.
"Yeah," she murmured. "I'm here."
"I'm very sorry for your loss ma'am," Detective Stewart continued, speaking slowly, in a soft, calculated way and Faith felt a surge of anger. She'd always hated in when people had talked down to her. And right now, the distrust she felt when she heard that tone in people's voice was intensified.
"Are you sure it was him?" she demanded, her voice tight with tension. There was a slight pause as the detective gathered his thoughts.
"As sure as we can be, ma'am," he offered. "He was initially tentatively identified by a neighbor that lived in the same apartment building as he. This lady was the one that reported him missing. She recognized the ring that he wore. She said it was new."
"But she could have been mistaken," Faith insisted. Her mind flashed to the silver ring she'd sent to him for his last birthday. Somehow though, she knew that what the detective was saying had to be true. It had been too long since Faith had talked to him. They'd never let more than six months pass by without checking in with each other. Faith never imagined that the messages she'd sent to his email address hadn't even been read.
"We thought so too ma'am," Det. Stewart agreed. "That's why we ran the DNA. The match was completely positive."
Faith felt dizzy again. Her free hand stole up to rub at her brow. This shouldn't have been happening. Right now, she should be on the phone with him, laughing and talking about her misadventures in Australia, where she'd been stranded after a demon had destroyed her land cruiser, leaving her in the middle of a desert with little water and barely any food.
But no, now she was talking to a police detective who worked in the unsolved murders division.
"You're sure?" she demanded again, softly, yearningly. There had to be some mistake. Somewhere along the line, if one little thing had been different… something someone said, or something someone did… then everything would have been okay.
"Yes Ms. Lehane," the detective answered decisively again. "Your son Simon was murdered."
