Life # 35: That time Harry and Tom were vampire slayers, part 2
After they dealt with the Judge with a rocket launcher, which was awesome, if Harry did say so herself, and Xander was amazing for having come up with that genius plan, Harry invited Jenny over to Giles' apartment for a little chat.
"You're saying your uncle gave you this ritual?" Harry asked, her hand on Jenny's throat. She wasn't pulling any punches, no matter Giles' quiet objections, because one of her friends had been hurt. For all that Angel had acted like a creepy stalker for a while, after Harry had made it clear she was done with him, Angel had respected her wishes and kept his distance, though still helping them with all the supernatural trouble that always came their way in Sunnydale. So Harry considered him a friend, and now Jenny had made Angel's soul go poof and turned him into a homicidal maniac overnight.
"My uncle Enyos told me Angel's soul was in danger because the original curse was deteriorating. He gave me the anchoring ritual, but instead of fixing the issue it caused him to lose his soul," Jenny said in a tight voice, Harry's fingers partially blocking her airways.
"So he set you up," Harry concluded with a sage nod.
"I'm so sorry," Jenny breathed, eyes wide and pleading. "I was only trying to help, I swear it."
"I believe you," Harry said with a sigh, releasing Jenny's throat. Giles stepped forward at once to check up on her.
"My clan were the ones to initially curse Angelus," Jenny explained later, after Giles had made them all cups of tea and they were sitting around Giles' living room. "Throughout the generations we've always kept an eye on him, to make sure he kept suffering and for a century he did. But then he changed, started taking part in life again, all because of you, Buffy. I was sent here to make sure he wouldn't find happiness, that our clan's vengeance would continue."
"Let me guess," Harry said before taking a sip of her tea. "Angel's life got too comfortable, so your clan decided to do away with him entirely. And to accomplish that they tricked you into disappearing his soul so I would end up staking him."
"That does make a disturbing amount of sense," Giles said, giving Jenny a dubious look. "I wish you'd told us about this sooner, Jenny."
"I didn't think I had to," Jenny whispered while looking down at her lap. "I thought I could serve both my clan and help you protect Sunnydale."
"Well, what's done is done," Harry said, not wanting to waste any time on what might have beens. "Your clan cursed Angel with a soul once. Let's do it again."
"The ritual was lost, as far as I know," Jenny said, though she looked interested in Harry's proposal.
Harry leaned forward, giving Jenny a hard look. "So find it. Do whatever it takes. Angel is a friend and I don't want to kill him. I will if I have to, but I much prefer to just ram his soul back into him and turn him into a real boy again instead of the demon he is now."
A few days later, Willow kept shooting Harry questioning looks while they were studying together in Harry's bedroom. Well, Willow was studying. Harry was going through some Adidas shirts she'd found in the local thrift store that afternoon, photographing them before listing them on eBay.
"Wills, I can hear your brain churning from over here," Harry eventually said, looking up at Willow with a smile. "What is it?"
"Aren't you… I don't know…heartbroken about Angel?" Willow finally asked, cheeks flaming.
"I broke up with him, remember?" Harry reminded her while resisting the urge to roll her eyes.
Willow's whole face did some very complicated things. "I know, but still…you made smoochies with him. That didn't mean anything to you?"
Harry sighed. Ah, to be a teenager again and to think that just because you kissed someone once or twice it was true love or some such rot. "Angel is my friend, but he's nothing more than that. I want him to get better, and we're working on that, but that's all there is to it."
"Okay," Willow said in a small voice, still so young and inexperienced that Harry realized she couldn't understand Harry's position, not for a few years at least, until she got a little older and wiser.
A week later it was the full moon and Oz turned out to be a werewolf, because why not? Nothing could surprise Harry at that point, she was sure. And that proved to be true a week or two after that when Xander and Cordelia had a little spat and Xander bribed a witch for a love spell and Harry got turned into a rat.
Ugh. That was just what she needed, one of her friends thinking magic would solve every single one of their petty problems (spoiler: it didn't). Harry had taken to studying the magic available in that world with the help of Giles, but she'd soon realized that the magic available was all ritual based and quite time consuming and thus couldn't be used while actively slaying. Harry now had a reasonable theoretical understanding of magic but rarely cast anything, other than a few simple spells she and Giles had tried out together, just so Harry could get a feel for the magic around them.
Later, after Harry was a girl again and everything was put to rights and Cordelia finally learned there were more important things in life than pleasing her useless friends, Harry grabbed Xander's arm and dragged him into an empty classroom.
"Xander, you're my friend and I love you," Harry said while Xander stared at her in confusion. "But if you ever dare cast, or have someone cast, anything resembling a love spell again, I will cut off your dick and feed it to you, do you understand?"
"What? Why?" Xander paled and stepped away from Harry.
"Love spells are the magical equivalent to date rape drugs," Harry said, crossing her arms. She hated any type of love spells or potions and anything that took away a person's free will, just because someone else couldn't take no for an answer. "I don't care how butt hurt you feel because Cordelia got her panties in a twist, you do not ever, EVER, try to take away her free will again, understood?"
"Yeah," Xander said in a trembling voice. "I hadn't looked at it like that. It won't happen again. Pinkie swear." And even though his hand shook a little, Xander held up his pinkie. Harry knew without a doubt if Xander would ever attend Hogwarts, he'd get sorted into Gryffindor in record time. Willow would go straight to Ravenclaw, of course.
Harry hooked her own pinkie around Xander's. "Pinkie swear accepted."
Ah, teenagers and their inability to realize there were consequences to their actions. And sixteen-year-old boys were generally not known for their critical thinking and decision making skills. Harry would cut Xander some slack, hoping her little talk put the fear of the slayer into him and he'd think twice before resorting to witchcraft to solve his personal issues from now on.
Meanwhile, Angel was laying low but still made his presence known through some very disturbing attempts at wooing Harry. She regularly got drawings in the mail, or chocolates and roses, or little notes proclaiming Angel was the only one allowed to kill her and other romantic gestures like that. Also, dead people showed up all over the place and that didn't sit well with Harry.
"I want to help Angel, I really do," Harry said to Giles during their weekly Sunday afternoon chat. "But at the same time, I also realize Angel is not more important than any of the people he's killing. He got Theresa the other day, turned her into a vampire. She was just an innocent high school student. She had just as much right to live a long, happy life than anyone else."
"Yes, I agree this poses a bit of a dilemma," Giles agreed while folding his hands in his lap in a solemn gesture. "However, Angel with his soul restored is a powerful force for good and can ultimately save many lives in the future."
"Yeah, that's true, but tell that to Theresa," Harry said with a deep sigh.
Of course, that whole discussion soon became a moot point because Angel murdered Jenny and Harry was just done.
There were limits to the kind of bullshit Harry was willing to put up with, and her friends being murdered was very much crossing that line.
Of course, Harry had to save Giles' ass first, since he'd gone off his rocker completely and tried to kill Angel by himself and yeah, that plan was doomed from the start. But Harry all but shoved Giles out the factory door and then went after Angel with everything she got.
And she got a lot, much more than Angel ever realized.
Harry had brought her katana, which she'd recently purchased from an antiquarian in LA. A genuine Japanese sword, made to be used, not one of those cheap knock-offs that were meant to only be put up on a wall for display.
No, this katana was hand-crafted and sharp enough to cut through a piece of paper and Harry loved it. Ever since she'd been a samurai in life # 9, she'd wanted to buy a katana again and now she finally had an excuse to do so.
She ran after Angel, who'd fled like the fucking coward he was while the factory burned down around them and she caught up with him eventually.
Angel clearly wasn't expecting Harry to swing a razor sharp sword at him with practised ease and had trouble defending himself while avoiding the blade. The fight was short and brutal and eventually Harry managed to skimp Angel's head with her blade, partially scalping him and knocking him to his knees. She next made to swing at his neck to cut his head off, but Angel leaned back at the last second, holding up a hand in a feeble attempt to deflect the blow.
Harry cut off Angel's left arm right above the elbow. Blood gushed from Angel's head and stump and Harry readied herself to deal the final blow when Drusilla jumped on her back out of nowhere.
"No!" Drusilla snarled while Harry whirled around, trying to stab Drusilla with her katana. "You mustn't kill Daddy. Miss Edith said he has a job to do yet."
"I don't give a fuck what anyone says," Harry growled, finally getting purchase and stabbing Drusilla in her thigh, causing her to jump back and fall, but then Spike all but ran her over in his wheelchair, sending her crashing against the floor, and by the time she'd fought off those Sid and Nancy wannabes, Angel was gone, having dragged himself to safety somewhere.
And when Harry came home after that thrilling night, having changed out of her bloody shirt in her car and hiding her blood-soaked blade in the trunk, her mother was waiting for her with her arms crossed and a huge scowl on her face.
Turned out Angel had been telling her mother lots of little lies about their relationship.
"He's much too old for you, Buffy," her mom said with a disapproving frown.
"Mom, I did not sleep with him," Harry said, utterly exasperated and also kind of hurt her mother didn't believe her. "I kissed him once or twice, and then I broke things off because I knew he wasn't right for me."
"You don't have to lie about this, Buffy."
"I'm not lying!" Harry jumped up from her bed and glared at her mother. "What I am is deeply hurt that my own mother chooses to believe an obviously mentally unstable man over her own daughter."
That seemed to take Joyce aback and she swallowed while glancing down.
"I've had a long day," Harry muttered, staring off to the side. "Please get out of my room."
"Buffy, I'm sorry," Joyce said, but she still didn't sound like she actually believed Harry, just that she was sorry Harry was upset.
"Out. Please." Harry turned her back to her mother, her inner parent deeply disapproving of Joyce's attempt to lecture her daughter while having no clue what was really going on and not willing to listen to her daughter either.
Joyce left, perhaps realizing she had taken things too far. At least Harry hoped she did.
But they never did talk things out properly, though Harry knew they probably should have, because the next thing Harry knew she was in the hospital with some weird virus and a child killing demon on the loose. Joyce pretended nothing had happened when she visited and worried about her only child, and Harry let her, not having any energy to deal with any mother-daughter issues.
Just to add to the excitement Harry got possessed for a short while and Xander got to infiltrate the swim team where young men were transformed into creatures from the black lagoon or something and Harry was about ready for another vacation when it all went to shit for real.
Angel decided to end the world with the help of a demon named Acathla. Kendra came to town and was promptly killed by Drusilla and Harry became the number one suspect.
Snyder took great pleasure in expelling her, but Harry couldn't give two shits about that. She ran a successful business and she could easily get her GED over the coming year and still sign up for college. Or she could skip college altogether and continue her reselling business fulltime. Snyder's power trip had no real consequences for her life, no matter what the man liked to believe.
Then Spike showed up offering the world's most awkward truce, and Harry took it because she wasn't crazy and she knew that no matter how good she was, going up against Angel, Drusilla and Spike simultaneously while also stopping Acathla and saving Giles in the process was rather akin to suicide. Joyce found out about the slaying thing and freaked out, telling Harry to not come back, but Harry wasn't fazed by that too much, since she knew people said lots of things they didn't mean in the heat of the moment. Still, she had a world to save so any conversation to resolve their issue would have to wait until later.
Willow made with the mojo to give Angel back his soul, and she managed it after Angel had awoken Acathla, so Harry got to stab him in his gut and send him to hell anyway to save the world. Not that it bothered her that much at that point. She still remembered Giles' devastated face when they'd attended Jenny's funeral.
Early in the morning Harry snuck into her home, took a quick shower and got dressed in her most conservative clothes. She then took her Slayer Mobile and drove to the home of a lawyer she kept on retainer. Harry wasn't stupid and she'd worked as both a police officer and a lawyer in some of her past lives. She knew that sooner or later she'd run into trouble with the police, seeing as her destiny in life was to kill things. Not human things, but still, it was almost inevitable that Harry would have a little run in with the law eventually. So once she'd returned from LA the previous year and she was making her own money, she'd contacted a lawyer and put him on retainer.
Now she picked the man, named Simon Spencer, up from his home and together they drove to the police station. The officers there clearly hadn't expected Harry to show up with legal representation in tow, and after hours of waiting and giving statements Harry was told she was free to go. Giles had even shown up, beaten and bruised thanks to Angel's tender mercies, to give her an alibi. Not that Harry really needed one, since it was clear she had nothing to do with poor Kendra's death. She'd just discovered the body.
After thanking Mr Spencer profusely for his help and dropping him off back home, Harry treated herself to a late lunch at an In-N-Out Burger because after all the excitement of the past few days she craved some junk food, and then she drove home to face the music.
"Where have you been?" Joyce demanded, rushing into the living room when Harry stepped through the front door.
"The police station. Where they questioned me thoroughly and then let me go because I didn't kill Kendra." Harry inhaled a deep breath and sat down on the couch.
"Oh." That seemed to take some of the wind out of Joyce's sails and she visibly gathered herself up. "That's… I'm glad to hear that."
"I had to leave last night because there was a demon about to be unleashed that would have destroyed the entire world," Harry explained as patiently as she could. She realized this was all new and terrifying for her mother, but at the same time, she also remembered how she'd tried to explain this all before to her parents and they'd chucked her into a mental institution in response. "I had to stop that demon."
"And did you?" Joyce asked hesitantly.
Harry gestured around the room. "World's still here. Yeah, I did it, but I had help from my friends and Giles."
"I'm just…this is a lot to take in, Buffy," Joyce said, sitting down beside Harry on the couch.
"I get that, trust me. I never asked for this, Mom. But I am the slayer and it is my job to kill demons, and I take that job seriously, with or without your support." Harry wasn't going to offer her mom false platitudes or pretend she wasn't the slayer. "But I'm doing okay. My grades are up, I'm running my own business, and I kill the things that go bump in the night."
"Yes, I guess you have been doing better this past schoolyear," Joyce conceded with an uncertain smile.
"Please trust me," Harry said in a slightly pleading voice. "I love you, Mom, and I want for us to have a close relationship, but for that to work you have to trust me."
Joyce sighed before nodding. "I'll try, Buffy, I promise. But you have to make an effort to not exclude me from your life as much as you've been doing."
"Promise." Harry grinned at her mother. "Now that you know the truth, I will be more open." Not too open, since she didn't want to freak her mother out completely, but Harry was happy she could now at least tell her mother why she was going out late in the evening or why her clothes were torn or bloody.
Their relationship was still fragile but Harry did notice that whatever rift that had opened up between them was slowly closing again.
Harry's father had invited her to come stay with him again for the summer, and Harry drove to LA a week later, happy for the change of scenery and the lack of looming apocalypses. She spent some quality time with her dad, including a surprise week long trip to Paris, which her dad had arranged as a belated birthday present, since he hadn't been able to visit for her actually birthday six months earlier.
This wasn't Harry's first time in Paris, not by a long shot, but she still loved the city and she genuinely enjoyed spending time with her father, exploring the Louvre museum and going up the Eiffel Tower and eating at so many delicious little bistros. She sent postcards to all her friends and bought so many souvenirs she had trouble closing her suitcase.
Afterwards, her father had to get back to work, but Harry didn't mind driving around LA by herself in her Slayer Mobile, visiting some quality thrift stores to stock up on all manner of merchandise to add to her eBay store. She made some excellent profit that summer, while she also slayed a number of vampires and other nasties. A girl had to keep in shape after all.
When she got home again, her mother seemed genuinely happy and relieved to see her, and Harry felt the same, and when they spent the evening together, enjoying pizza and ice cream in front of the TV it felt like something of a new start for their relationship.
Then her mother brought home some cursed mask and suddenly there were zombies everywhere during an impromptu welcome home party that got out of hand. God, Harry hated zombies of any kind.
It was then that Harry learned she'd been selfish without even realizing it when she heard that Willow, Xander, Oz and Cordelia had been defending Sunnydale and hunting vampires all summer while Harry was enjoying Paris and zooming around Hollywood and Beverly Hills looking for cheap second hand luxury goods. Yeah, she had dropped the ball there, and after listening to her friends' complaints she promised to never forsake her slaying duties like that again. The summer after the Master's defeat had been very quiet in Sunnydale, but the past couple of months had been business as usual with only a handful of teenagers to defend the whole town, and Harry now understood that being the Slayer meant that you kept to your post instead of taking two month long vacations. Lesson learned, and she gave her friends the souvenirs she'd bought them in Paris with lots of heartfelt apologies.
School started up again and Harry was no longer expelled so she attended like usual since Snyder didn't have a valid reason to keep her out. After meeting with Snyder before the summer holidays, Joyce was frothing at the mouth with anger at the injustice of Snyder expelling Buffy without any real reason at all and immediately got the schoolboard involved so before long Harry was reinstated as a student and allowed back in classes the next schoolyear. Not that she'd been worried. If Snyder had kept her out indefinitely, she would have convinced her mother to just let her take her GED and sign up for college the next year. But Harry enjoyed going to school because that allowed her to hang out with her friends, and gather in the library to spend time with Giles while they investigated whatever new threat arose.
It wasn't a threat, though, what arose next.
Harry met up with her friends at the Bronze, where Willow apparently tried to set her up with a kid named Scott, who was nice and all, but Harry was saving herself for Tom pretty much and didn't want to date anyone in the meantime, least of all a seventeen year old kid. Some awkwardness ensued as Harry tried to let the guy down gently, while Willow kept trying to not so subtly get Buffy to agree to go on a date or something.
But then Harry saw a girl leave with what was obviously a vampire, judging by his twenty-year-old dance moves, and she rushed after them out the door.
Where she got a very welcome surprise when the girl kicked the vampire's butt and turned to her.
"I've got this," Tom said, after pausing for a brief moment while her memories returned in an unexpected rush. "You're Buffy, right? I'm Faith." And with that, Tom made short work of the vampire. Harry admired her form and had to keep herself from jumping into Tom's arms and kissing her silly in sheer relief to have found her at last. Harry's friends were watching and she wouldn't be able to explain away that sudden act of intimacy.
"Pleasure to meet you," Harry said with a huge smile after the vamp was dust.
"Oh no," Tom said and pulled Harry into a tight hug, which Harry returned at once with a happy sigh. "The pleasure is all mine."
"I should probably take you to meet Giles, my Watcher," Harry said once she stepped back from the hug.
"No," Xander said, sounding mightily disappointed. "That can wait, right? Maybe just hang out with us this evening?"
"Nah," Harry said with a chuckle, gently grabbing Tom's arm and dragging her along. "You guys stay and have a good time. Duty calls for us. To the Slayer Mobile."
"Aw, man," Xander said, shaking his head while Cordelia slapped his arm.
Harry didn't stay to see what else happened. She all but pushed Tom into her Beetle and threw herself behind the wheel and tore out of there, tires screeching across the asphalt.
Tom looked at her in surprise. "Are we in a hurry?"
Harry didn't reply until she parked her car in a dark stretch of street beside one of Sunnydale's many cemeteries. "Yes, because I've missed you and I need to kiss you right now." And giving Tom no chance to reply, Harry crushed her lips to Tom's, who grinned for a second before returning the kiss.
"I got my memories back more than a year ago," Harry whispered after they snogged for a good ten minutes. "I've missed you so much it almost drove me nuts at times. Being a Slayer is lonely work even without a missing soulmate."
"I'm here, darling," Tom said, trailing her fingers down Harry's cheek. "From now on, we're in this together."
"Thank fuck." Harry rested her forehead against Tom's and just breathed for a moment, finally feeling whole again, with a sort of inner-peace washing over her that she hadn't even realized she'd been missing before.
"Can we visit your Watcher, though?" Tom asked after a few peaceful, quiet moments. "I've got some news to share."
"Sure. He knows, by the way." Harry started the car and buckled her seatbelt. "I told him about our past lives."
"Really?" Tom seemed intrigued by that idea, since they hadn't really told anyone about their situation before, not in any detail. "How did that go?"
"Better than expected. At first Giles was a little disbelieving but ever since then he's become a good friend on top of being my Watcher."
"Yeah," Tom said with a thoughtful look. "Must be nice to have an adult friend to turn to from time to time while you're still physically a teenager surrounded by nothing but other teenagers."
Harry cracked up, and shook her head, "You have no idea. The petty drama I have to deal with."
"Darling, say no more. We've raised plenty of kids together."
Harry briefly glanced at Tom with a wide grin. "We've been plenty of kids together."
"Yes, that too. But I'd like to think we have better self-control, even as teenagers," Tom said with a haughty little sniff.
Reaching over, Harry patted Tom's knee. "Sure, babe, whatever you say."
It was only just after nine, so Harry didn't feel too bad knocking on Giles' door unannounced.
"Buffy? Is something wrong?" Giles asked the moment he found her on his doorstep.
"Giles," Harry said, beaming at her Watcher. "I'd like you to meet Tom."
Giles' eyes widened and his mouth dropped open a little while Tom stepped up to him.
"Also known as Faith Lehane, slayer," Tom said, holding out her hand, which Giles shook after he recovered from his brief moment of shock.
They made some small talk while Giles put the kettle on, which quickly turned into serious slayer talk when Giles asked after Tom's watcher.
"Elizabeth Rosegard," Tom said, shoulders slumping and eyes shimmering. "She was murdered by Kakistos, an older than dirt vampire. Also the reason I came here, because I cannot take that monster by myself."
"I'm so sorry to hear that," Giles said while Harry slid her arm around Tom's waist and pulled her into a brief hug. "I'll make a report to the council and see what they have to say. In the meantime, of course you can stay with us."
Harry snorted. "Giles, I don't think I have to explain this to you, but the Council may be in for a surprise. Tom's staying here indefinitely."
"Yeah, not leaving your side, darling, no matter what any Council says," Tom quickly agreed. "Technically, we don't even work for them." At Giles' confused look, Tom added, "We've never signed any contracts and we don't receive a salary, simple as that."
"Yeah, what is up with that? So unfair," Harry said, suddenly feeling all affronted. She had mentioned that to Giles a time or two, and while Giles sympathized with her plight, being expected to do all the dangerous work without any pay while Giles received a generous Watcher's salary on top of his income as a high school librarian, there was nothing he personally could do about it. "Anyway, now that Tom and I have found each other, wild demons couldn't separate us, let alone a bunch of stuffy old, white men."
"And I expected nothing less," Giles said with a bit of a sappy smile as he looked between them both. "At any rate, I'm glad you found each other again."
"So are we," Harry said, leaning her head on Tom's shoulder.
They stayed for tea and more small talk, in which Tom recounted some of the adversaries she'd faced, and Harry let Tom in on her improvements to her life.
"You could easily join my eBay business," Harry offered at once when the subject of an income for Tom came up.
"Sure, I'd love to," Tom said and then fell quiet for a moment, turning her mug of tea around in her hands. "But perhaps it's also a smart idea not to put all our eggs in one website. You know eBay can screw over a successful business overnight by changing their terms."
"Don't remind me," Harry muttered. They'd suffered big losses in more than one lifetime when some website suddenly introduced new rules and they had to scramble to keep their ecommerce income stable.
"So I'll help at first, but at the same time I'll start a small web design business," Tom mused while looking at Harry in question. "Focus on smaller businesses and convince them the time for a website of their own is now. And I can also pick up some freelance translation jobs."
"It sounds like you won't have to worry about an income, at least," Giles said with an approving nod. Giles had at first seemed highly sceptical when Harry had started her eBay business, but eventually, upon seeing how much she enjoyed the work and how much money she was making on the side, he'd admitted to being impressed with these new opportunities to earn a living over the internet.
"Oh yeah, we'll land on our feet," Tom said with an easy smile. "We always do."
Tom was staying at a sleazy motel and Harry was reluctant to drive her there, but she also couldn't bring her home unexpected, especially since it was close to midnight already and she didn't want to spring this on her mother while she was probably already in bed.
"Darling, don't worry," Tom said while waving away Harry's concerns. "I'll be fine. We've lived in much worse places and it's only temporary. Once I get some money going I'll rent a studio or one bedroom apartment or so."
"Yeah, all right," Harry sighed, pulling up in front of the motel and reluctantly turning off the engine. "I don't mean to sound like a spoiled brat, but I just want us to be together, especially after last life."
A brief shadow of pain passed over Tom's face. "I know the feeling. And we will be, Harry, I promise. We just need the barest amount of patience to set everything up."
"I love you, babe," Harry whispered, leaning over to give Tom a heartfelt kiss.
"Love you, too, darling." Tom smiled against Harry's lips before pulling back and opening the car door. "I'll see you tomorrow. Also, we should get cell phones."
"Yes!" Excellent idea," Harry called after Tom, waving until Tom disappeared inside her room. With a heavy yet happy sigh, Harry started her car and headed home. Tom was back and there was no force in this world that would keep them apart.
Her mother tried, briefly, when Harry invited Tom over for dinner. Tom, being her charming self, made a very nice first impression on Joyce, but the moment Harry joined her mother in the kitchen, Joyce immediately suggested Harry quit her destiny and let Tom do all the slaying from now on.
"Mom," Harry said, quietly outraged at the mere suggestion she abandon her fellow slayer. "I will not leave Faith to fight by herself. We are both slayers, and we will both fight, side by side."
"I just mean that you might have a chance at a normal life," Joyce said with pleading eyes.
"I don't want a normal life if it means someone else has to pay the ultimate price for it," Harry said through gritted teeth before turning her back on Joyce and joining Tom in the dining room again.
Harry knew she probably should talk about her future in more detail with her mother, because it was clear Joyce had very different ideas about Harry's life than Harry herself did, but then Kakistos came to town and Harry and Tom kicked his butt, and they got busy with other threats like that boy who went all Mr Hyde on everyone and Slayerfest 1998 was apparently a thing now, though Harry and Tom had no problems taking out that hodgepodge of assassins come to kill them.
By that time, Tom had found a two-bedroom apartment not too far from Giles' place. Surprisingly, rent was reasonably low considering this was California, but Sunnydale did have a bit of a negative reputation, not to mention a significantly higher mortality rate than surrounding towns, so clearly that kept rent down somewhat. Harry chipped in on the rent, since she already knew she'd be spending lots of time there, and once she turned eighteen in January, would probably move in with Tom full-time.
Thankfully, Harry's friends took to Tom right away and helped Tom decorate her new apartment with donations of surplus items recovered from their family's basements, attics and garages. Tom and Harry also bought lots of furniture and household goods at their local thrift stores while they were looking for merchandise and before long the apartment looked like a home, albeit an eclectic one. The second bedroom was turned into a storage room slash office, from which they could run their businesses.
Tom did get involved in the eBay business, easily doubling their profit, since she had plenty of free time during the day, while also finding a few local clients to design websites for. Tom signed up to get her GED and also applied for colleges, especially the one in Sunnydale, since Harry begged her to, not wanting to go through college without her soulmate.
And then the next step was coming out to their friends and family. Obviously, Harry and Tom were in a relationship, but no one besides Giles knew it, so it was time to tell their loved ones.
The reactions they got from their friends, who'd come over to watch a movie at Tom's apartment on a Thursday night, were varied.
"I'm dating Faith," Harry said with an enormous smile, giving her friends an expectant look.
"Cool," Oz said, with an approving nod.
"I did not see this coming," Cordelia said, looking around the room. "Did anyone see this coming? I mean, I'm not surprised Buffy plays for her own team, what with her lack of dating anyone of the opposite gender, but I still didn't see it coming."
"Oh no," Willow sighed, face a picture of guilt. "I tried to set you up with Scott, and all this time you didn't want to date a boy and you did tell me you weren't interested, but I just thought maybe the whole Angel thing had gotten you down so I pushed anyway and I am so sorry, Buffy."
"Willow, breathe," Harry said with a snicker. "It's fine, really, no hard feelings."
"Is this a dream?" Xander asked, sounding slightly panicked. "Am I dreaming right now? Because I swear, I have had dreams about Buffy and Faith doing non-slaying things together, but they usually start with less clothes on."
"Xander!" Cordelia turned in her seat to glare at him. "No one wants to know the kind of things you dream about, especially when they don't involve me."
Harry rolled her eyes. Teenaged boys. And she should know, having been one more times than she could remember at that point.
Just as Harry got ready to tell Joyce about her new girlfriend, the whole town went nuts and Joyce and Giles turned into the teenagers from hell because of the band candy. Snyder was suddenly their best friend, Giles and Joyce couldn't stop snogging and Harry and Tom were the only people left in the whole of Sunnydale with an ounce of common sense left, or so it felt.
Still, they all saved the day and lots of innocent babies, so they couldn't complain too much in the end.
Afterwards, Tom came over to hang out and Harry held her hand and stepped up to her mother, who was sitting on the couch watching some TV.
"Mom, I have to tell you something," Harry said, nervous but also excited, because she loved Tom and she wanted everyone to know how happy Tom made her. "I'm dating Faith."
Joyce looked between them with wide eyes. "What?"
"We're dating," Harry said slowly, holding up their entwined hands. "As in, Faith is my girlfriend."
"No," Joyce said, blinking very rapidly, lips pursed in a thin line.
"What?" Harry asked, confused. She wasn't expecting a negative reaction, since as far as she knew Joyce wasn't homophobic at all. She worked with a gay couple in the gallery, often coming home with funny stories about them.
"No," Joyce said, louder now, shoulders straightening and eyes narrowing. "I forbid this, Buffy."
And something in Harry snapped. The world turned very still around her while her breathing picked up.
"Why?" Tom asked quietly, looking very surprised by this turn of events.
"I do not owe you any explanation, but know this, as long as Buffy lives under my roof she will obey my rules, and I want you to leave, Faith, and not come back," Joyce said, sounding nothing if not determined. "You've done enough already."
"Fine," Harry said, ears ringing slightly. Perhaps she was overreacting, but after all the crap her mother had pulled on her over the last few years, she was just done with her. The mental institution, not believing Harry's word over Angel's accusations, basically throwing Harry out after finding out about the slayer thing, albeit temporarily, and more recently, constantly trying to get Harry to quit her destiny that she couldn't quit to let Tom take the fall.
Yeah, Harry was just done and it ended now.
"You think that if you force me to choose between you and Faith, that I will choose you, but you are wrong, Mom," Harry said with steel in her voice and fire in her eyes. "I will never choose anyone over Faith, not even you. Besides, this is emotional blackmail, which I won't be partaking in."
"Buffy…" Joyce looked stuck somewhere between panic and determination.
"No, listen. Here is what is going to happen. Faith and I will be gathering my belongings, and I will stay with her for the foreseeable future. If you try to involve the police in this, since I am still a minor and technically under your authority, know that I will order my lawyer to get me emancipated and I will never speak to you again."
"Buffy, that isn't fair," Joyce said, jumping up from the couch.
"What you are doing isn't fair, Mom." Harry gave her mother a hard look. "You haven't been fair in a very long time, so please take your time alone to think about the things you've done and perhaps how you could have prevented them from happening, and maybe, a very small maybe, I'll forgive you at some point in the future. Come on, Faith, let's get my things."
Thanks to their slayer strength, they got Harry's stuff in record time, especially since they'd already moved all the merchandise to Tom's second bedroom during the previous weeks. Joyce stood to the side, looking lost one moment and enraged the next, but Harry ignored her. She loved her mother, she really did, but she had too much crap on her plate to have to deal with her mother's emotional blackmail, not to mention she was too old to be treated like a rebellious teenager going through some undesirable phase.
"I'm sorry," Tom said as they drove Harry's car, which was loaded to the brim with clothes and books and weapons, to Tom's apartment.
"Me, too," Harry sighed, fingers tapping against the steering wheel in agitation. "I think this is about the slaying, not so much the being two girls in a relationship."
"How is this about slaying?" Tom asked with a quirked eyebrow as she glanced at Harry.
"She's been trying to get me to quit slaying now that you are here, believing that if you take over my job I can have a normal life, or what she believes to be a normal life anyway."
"Go to Harvard or Yale, find a nice hubbie, work a good job, pop out a few babies, that sort of thing," Tom guessed with an unflattering snort.
"Yeah, pretty much that. But she's never, ever once asked me if I even want any of those things." Harry pulled into a parking lot in front of Tom's apartment. "Which I don't want. I'm the slayer. Not a career I've chosen, but one I intend to see through."
"Yeah, same for me," Tom agreed with a smile.
"And together we might even manage to not die before we're twenty," Harry added with a sarcastic roll of her eyes. She was well aware she could die every time she went out to patrol. She tried not to think about it too often but it was always there in the back of her mind. Slayers didn't live very long as a rule, which only made Harry more determined to spend whatever time they had in this life together with Tom.
"The mortality rate amongst slayers is a slight cause for concern, yes," Tom agreed while shaking her head before getting out of the car to start unloading Harry's entire life.
Joyce didn't send the police to come drag Harry away from her new home, so that was good, but she did send Giles.
"Joyce sent me. I'm sorry," Giles said immediately once Harry waved him inside. Tom got the kettle going, since they might be Americans this life, in their heart of hearts they were British and always enjoyed a good cup of tea, especially in times of crisis.
"Me, too," Harry said while they said down on the couch as Tom served the tea, using a beautiful porcelain tea set they'd found for a few bucks at a thrift store. "I'm pretty sure this is because my mom is convinced I can just quit being the slayer as long as Tom picks up the slack or something. She just forgot to ask me what I wanted, I guess."
"Yes, it does seem that she's cast Faith in the role of the bad guy in this scenario," Giles agreed with a solemn nod.
"I'm not going back until she apologizes," Harry said, mind made up. "If I go back at all, since I kinda like living with my soulmate."
"I'll tell her that," Giles said with a sigh, and then gave them both a careful look. "The Council got in contact. They're sending a new Watcher for Faith soon."
Tom blinked and then leaned back in the couch. "Nope. Tell them not to bother. I quit."
"What?" Giles asked, obviously surprised.
"I quit the Council, not the slaying," Tom said, mouth slowly curving up into a wicked grin. "Until the Council agrees to pay me a decent salary, I quit. Simple as that."
"Oh!" Harry gave Giles an apologetic smile. "Sorry, Giles. But I quit the Council, too. Not you, personally, you're great. But from now on, I will only work for the Council if they pay me."
Giles seemed dumbstruck for a moment and then he laughed. "Oh, I can't wait to tell them that."